')3 




.^^-- 




Cr^/3^<^ju^ 



DIALOGUE IN HADES. 



A PARALLEL OF MILITARY ERRORS, OF WHICH THE FRENCH 

AND ENGLISH ARMIES WERE GUILTY, DURING THE 

CAMPAIGN OF 1T59, IN CANADA. 



ATTRIBUTED TO CHEVALIER JOHNSTONE, 



Published under the Auspices of the 

|ii«Hm|]J and gtstori([!il ^^acictjiof ^ii^bi|i| 



3 



[REPRINTED.] 



QUEBEC : 

I'RINTKD AT THE "MORNING CHRONICLE" OFFICE. 
1887. 



/ 



DIALOGUE IN HADES. 

A PARALLEL OF MILITARY ERRORS, OF WHICH THE FRENCH 

AND ENGLISH ARMIES WERE GUILTY, DURING THE 

CAMPAIGN OF 1T59, IN CANADA. 



ATTRIBUTED TO CHEVALIER lOHNSTONE, 



Published under the Auspices of the 






[REPRINTED.] 



QUEBEC: 

PKINTED AT THE "MORNING CHRONICLE" OFFICE, 

.1887, 



"^-^oY <Vc: ■*- 



'1Z 






[The original of this manuscript is deposited in the French war archives, 
in Paris ; a copy was, with the permission of the Frencli Government, taken in 
1855, and deposited in the Library of the Legislative Assembly of Canada. 
The Literary and Historical Society of Quebec, through the kindness of Mr. 
Todd, the Librarian, was permitted to have communication thereof. This 
document is supposed to have been written about the year 1765, that is five 
years after the return to France from Canada of the writer, the Chevalier 
Johnstone, a Scottish Jacobite, who had fled to France after the defeat at 
CuUoden, and obtained from the French monarch, with several other 
Scotchmen, commissions in the French armies. In 1748, says Francisque 
Michel* " he sailed from Rochefort as an Ensign with troops going to Cape 
Breton ; he continued to serve in America until he returned to France, in 
December, 1760, having acted during the campaign of 1759, in Canada, as 
aide-de-camp to Chevalier de Levis. On Levis being ordered to Montreal, 
Johnstone was detached and retained by General Montcalm on his staff, on 
account of his thorough knowledge of the environs of Quebec, and particularly 
of Beauport, where the principal works of defence stood, and where the whole 
army, some 11,000 men, were entrenched, leaving in Quebec merely a garrison 
of 1500. The journal is written in English, and is not remarkable for 
orthography or purity of diction ; either Johnstone had forgotten or had never 
thoroughly known the language. The style is prolix, sententious, abounding 
in quotations from old writers. This document had first attracted the 
attention of one of the late historians of Canada, the Abb6 Ferland, who 
attached much importance to it, as calculated to supply matters of detail and 
incidents unrecorded elsewhere. Colonel Margry, in charge of the French 
records, had permitted the venerable writer, then on a visit to Pai'is, to make 
extracts from it ; some of which extracts, the abb6 published at the time of 
the laying of the St. Foy Monument, in 1862. The Chevalier Johnstone differs 
in toto from the opinions expressed by several French officers of regulars, 
respecting the conduct of the Canadian Militia, in 1759, ascribing to their 
valour, on the 13th September, the salvation of a large portion of the French 
army. He has chosen the singular, though not unprecedented mode of the 
Dialogue, to recapitulate the events of a campaign in which he played a not 
inconsiderable part. "—J. M. LeMoine.] 



Les Ecossais en France, Vol. II., P. 449. 



[Pul)lished under tho auspices of the Literary and Historical Society of Quebec] 



A DIALOGUE IN HADES. 



A PARALLEL OF MILITAPvY ERRORS, OF WHICH THE FRENCH 

AND ENGLISH ARMIES WERE GUILTY, DURING THE 

CAMPAIGN OF 1759. IN CANADA. 



The Marquis de Montcalm : — Having ardently 
desired a conversation with yon, sir, npon the operations of 
a campaign which proved to both of ns so fatal, I have 
sought you continually amongst the shades ever since I 
descended here, where 1 soon followed you. 

GrENERAL "WoLFE : — I Can assure you, sir, I was equally 
impatient to meet with you. Some of my countrymen, 
arrived here since the battle of the 13th September, informed 
me that there was only an interval of a few hours in our 
sharing the same hard fate. They gave me some accounts 
of that event which joined Canada to the British 
dominions ; but as they had a very imperfect knowledge of 
the circumstances, and entirely ignorant of your plan of 
operations, I have little information from them, and I am 
heartly glad that chance at last has procured me the 
pleasure of seeing you. 

Montcalm : — Will you permit me, sir, before our con- 
versation becomes serious, to offer some reflections upon 
the difference in our destiny. Your nation rendered you 
the greatest honours ; your body was conveyed to 
London, and buried their magtiificently in Westminster 
Abbey, amongst your kings. Generous Britons erected 
to your memory a superb monument over your grave, at 



public expense ; and your name, most dear to your country- 
men, is ever in their mouths, accompanied with praise and 
regret. But in my country what a strange indifference ? 
What sensation did my death make upon my compatriots ? 
My conduct denounced and censured without measure, is 
the continual subject of conversation for gossiping fools 
and knaves, who form the majority in all communities, and 
prevail against the infinitely small number to be found of 
honest, judicious, impartial men, capable of reflection. The 
Canadians and savages who knew the uprightness of my 
soul, ever devoted to the interests of my beloved king and 
country, they alone rendered me justice, with a few sincere 
friends, who, not daring to oppose themselves openly to 
the torrent of my enemies, bewailed in secret my unhappy 
fate, and shed on my tomb their friendly tears. 

Wolfe : — In this blessed abode, inaccessible to prejudice, 
I vow to you, sir, I envy your condition, notwithstanding 
the horrible injustice and ingratitude of your countrymen. 
What can give more pleasure and self-satisfaction than the 
esteem and approbation of honest men ? You were 
severely regretted and lamented by all those who were 
capable of discerning and appreciating your superior merit, 
talents, and eminent qualities. Disinterested persons of 
probity must respect your virtue. All officers versed in 
the art of war will justify your military tactics, and your 
operations can be blamed only by the ignorant. Were my 
army consulted, they would be as many witnesses in your 
favour. Your humanity towards prisoners won you the 
heart of all my soldiers. They saw with gratitude and 
veneration your continual care and vigilance to snatch 
them from out of the hands of the Indians, when those 
barbarians were ready to cut their throats, and prepared to 
make of human flesh their horrible banquets ; refusing me 
even tears at my death, they weeped and bewailed your 
hard fate ; I see in my mausoleum the proof onlv of 



human weakness ! What does that block of marble avail 
to me in my present state ? The monument remains, but 
the conqueror has perished. The affection, approbation 
and regret of the worthiest part of mankind is greatly- 
preferable and much above the vain honours conferred by 
a blind people,' who judge according to the event, and are 
incapable to analyse the operations. I was unknown to 
them before the expedition which I commanded in Canada ; 
and if fortune, to whom I entirely owe my success, had 
less favoured me, perhaps, like Byng, I would have been 
the victim of a furious and unruly populace. The 
multitude has and can have success only for the rule of 
their judgment. 

Montcalm :— I am much obliged to you, sir, for your 
favourable opinion of me. Let us leave weak mortals to 
crawl from error to error, and deify to-day what they will 
condemn to-morrow. It is at present, when the darkness 
is dispelled from before our eyes, that we can contemplate 
at leisure the passions of men, who move as the waves of 
the sea, push on each other and often break upon the 
rocks ; and in our present state, when all prejudices are at 
an end, let us examine impartially the operations of- 175 9, 
which was the epocha of the loss to France of her northern 
colonies in America. 

Wolfe : — Most willingly, sir, and to show my 
frankness, I own to you I was greatly surprised on arriving 
with the English fleet at Quebec without meeting with 
any oppsition by the French in the river St. Lawrence. 

Montcalm : — Yoii had reason to be so. It was not 
my fault that you did not meet with many obstacles in 
your way. I proposed to have a redoubt and battery erected 
upon Cape Tourmente, which is a rock above fifty feet 
high, facing the Traverse at the east^ end of the Island of 



* Formerly, inward bound ships, instead of taking the south channel lower 
down than Goose Island, struck over from Cape Tourmente, and took the 
south channel between Madame Island and Pointe Argentenay. 



6 

Orleans, where all the vessels cross from the north to the 
south side of the St. Lawrence river. They are obliged to 
approach very near the Cape before they enter into the 
Traverse, and its height above the men-of-war would have 
secured it against the effect of the artillery. Besides, this 
rock, almost perpendicular, commanding all round it, the 
fort would have been impregnable, and not susceptible of 
being besieged. Thus the first of your ships which 
approached to pass the Traverse would have been raked 
by the plunging fire of the battery from stern to bowsprit, 
and must have been sunk. I had likewise the project of 
placing a battery and a redoubt upon the upper point of 
the bay which is opposite to the west end of Isle aux 
Coudres. The current between this island and the main 
land being incredibly rapid at low water, all the vessels 
coming up the river must have cast anchor there to wait 
. until the next tide ; and my artillery upon the point of 
that bay would have battered your ships at anchor from 
fore to aft ; have put in a most terrible confusion your 
ships, who could not have taken up their anchors without 
being instantly dashed to pieces against the rocks by the 
violence of the current, forced, as they would have been 
by it, to have their bowsprits alw^ays pointed to the battery, 
without being able to fire at it. Your fleet would have had 
no knowledge of the battery until they were at anchor, so 
you may easily judge how it would have distressed them. 
I proposed this, but I did not command in chief ; it was 
the Marquis de Vaudreuil, Governor G-eneral of Canada, 
who should have ordered it to be put into execution. 

Wolfe: — If they had executed your project, it would 
have puzzled us, and retarded for some time our 
operations. 

Montcalm : — That was all I could wish for, as I was 
always sensible of the great advantage, in certain 
situations, of gaining time from the enemy, especially in 



such a climate as Canada, where the summer is so short 
that it is impossible to keep the field longer than from the 
month of May till the beginning of October, and your fleet 
arrived at Isle aux Coudres at the end of June. 

"Wolfe : — There is no doubt that you are in the right. 
Our fleet arrived in the river St. Lawrence six weeks too 
late, which is commonly the fate of all great naval expedi- 
tions. Fleets are seldom ready to sail at the time appointed ; 
and this often renders fruitless the best concocted enter- 
prise by sea, from the uncertainty of the arrival of the army 
at its destination. The smallest delay is often dangerous, as 
it gives the enemy the time to prej^are themselves for 
defence, without hurry or confusion. 

Montcalm : — I will not conceal from you, sir, that I 
always looked upon the distribution you made of your army 
upon your landing near Quebec, as diametrically opposed 
to the established principles in castrametation. It is a 
known axiom in the art of war, that an army ought to be 
encamped in such a manner as to have a free and easy com- 
munication with all its parts ; that they may unite quickly 
without any obstruction, and be able to defend and sustain 
each other reciprocally over the whole extent of the camp, 
in case any part of it is attacked. You divided your army 
in three different camps ; one of them ujDon the Poiute 
Levis, another upon the Island of Orleans, and the third at 
the Sault de Montmorency. The two branches of the St, 
Lawrence river, which forms the Island of Orleans, each of 
them about half a mile broad, separated your three camps, 
without a possibility of establishing a communication 
between them ; and your camp upon the Pointe Levis was 
at a distance of six miles from your camp at the Sault de 
Montmorency. Your position was such that had we fallen 
with our army on any of your three camps, we would have 
cut them to pieces, before those of your other twoTcamps 
could have come to their assistance. The knowledge for 



8 

choosing an advantageous ground for encamping an army, 
always appears to me to be one of the most essential talents 
requisite in a general. How could you remain quietly in 
such a dangerous position during two moi^ths, without 
trembling. 

"Wolfe : — "What hindered you then, sir, from executing 
that which appeared to you so easy ? 

Montcalm : — "We attempted it, but with very bad suc- 
cess. Seven days alter your landing at the Pointe Levis, 
Mr. Dumas, Major of the Colony troops, was sent to attack 
your camp at the Pointe Levis, with a body of fifteen hun- 
dred men, who, in the night, crossed the river St. Lawrence 
at Quebec, without being discovered by your advanced 
guards. But they were no sooner landed and marching, 
than, struck with a panic, the utmost disorder suddenly 
ensued ; their heads turned, and, losing their senses entire- 
ly, they fired at each other, believing themselves attacked 
by your army. In short, they immediately fled back to 
their boats with the greatest precipitation and confusion. 
Discouraged by this bad beginning, M. de Yaudreuil would 
never listen to any proposals of further attempts upon your 
camps ; and it was decided to keep ourselves for the future 
upon the defensive. 

Wolfe : — It appears to me, however, that you were 
not encamped in a proper manner to be upon the defensive. 
Your army did not amount to ten thousand men, and your 
camp extended seven or eight miles. 

Montcalm : — I agree with you, and am sensible that 
the longer the line, the weaker it is in its several parts. I 
am convinced that it is impossible to prevent a line from 
being forced ; and I believed likewise that, landing on a 
coast where there are several leagues of it to be defended, 
equally susceptible of descent, is the same case as lines. He 
who attacks has all his force concentrated at a single point, 
which he may choose as he pleases ; anywhere in the extent 



of his lines ; on the contrary, he who is attacked in his 
entrenchments has his force divided over the whole extent 
of his lines, and does not know on what part of them the 
enemy has the intention to make his real attack, so that he 
must be everywhere equally strong- and guarded over all 
the ground occupied by his army. Thus the head of a 
column of a great depth of ranks must infallibly pierce 
through lines who have only at most two or three men 
deep ; and by feint attacks all over the front of a line, you 
cannot weaken one part of it by drawing troops from it to 
fortify another part of it, unless the point of the enemy's 
principal attack is manifestly known. It is certainly the 
same with regard to landings, where all the extent of the 
sea coast may be threatened at the same time, although it is 
a common opinion that a coast may be defended, and that 
an enemy may be repulsed in his attempt to make a descent 
by open force. 

I know not a better method to oppose a descent than to 
have bodies of troops in battle, ready to rush upon the en- 
emy, with their bayonets upon their muskets, attacking the 
moment the enemy land, whilst they are yet few and in con- 
fusion from the disorder which must necessarily happen at 
their coming out of their boats, and before they can present 
a considerable front in battle. 

Mv project of defence was to encamp on rising ground 
at Quebec, called by the French, Les Hauteurs d' Abraham, 
and make Quebec serve as the centre and pivot to all my 
operations, since it was evident that the fate of Canada de- 
pended entirely on its being preserved to us or taken by 
you, which decided whether that colony should remain to 
its ancient possessors or become your prize. 

"With this in view, I intrenched the borders of the St. 
Charles river, and remained encamped at Quebec until, re- 
ceiving tidings of your fleet having arrived in the St, Law- 
rence river, M. de Levis, an officer of great merit and distinc- 



10 

tion, proposed to change the position of our camp, by carry- 
ing our left wing to the Sault de Montmorency, and our 
right to the St. Charles river : this, as you say, made it six 
miles long on the north side of Quebec, and gave us great- 
er appearance of being on the offensive than on the defen- 
sive. 

He pretended that the presenting a great front to the 
enemy would give us a bold look, and inspire respect. As 
there can be no positive certainty in any military operation, 
from unforeseen accidents which often overturn the best 
combined project, I readily sacrificed to him my opinion, 
without insisting uj^on it. In this new position M. de Vaud- 
reuil commanded the right of our camp, near Quebec ; M. de 
Levis the left, at the Sault de Montmerency ; and I com- 
manded the centre,' at Beauport. 

"Wolfe : — Had you continued on the heights of Araham 
you would have saved Quebec, but you would have aban- 
doned to me all the country where I might have destroyed? 
burnt and ruined all the settlements at some leagues round 

it. 

Montcalm : — That may be, but Canada would not have 

been taken, and certainly you durst not penetrate far into 
the country, leaving Quebec behind you. Had you attack- 
ed me, I would have had the advantage of the rising ground, 
which I would have fortified with intrenchments, and with 
a chain of reboubts from Quebec to Cap Rouge, where these 
heights terminate in a deep raA^ine, with a small river at the 
bottom of it, overhung with rocks, at three leagues from Que- 
bec. This advantageous position, not to be successfully at- 
tacked by any number of men, would have been my advan- 
ced post. 

My right would have been applied to Quebec, and 
sustained by it. I never could guess, sir, your idea in re- 
ducing ,that town to ashes as you did, by throwing upon it 
continually, from your batteries on the opposite side of the 
river, that immense number of carcases and shells. 



11 

It seems to me that when an army besieges a town, it 
is with the intention, on its surrendering, to keep possession 
of it, and have houses in it to lodge the troops, instead of 
heaps of ruins. This conduct was still more essentially ne- 
cessary fi'om the season being advanced, and from the impos- 
sibility of carrying-on any kind of house building during the 
winter. Moreover, the utter destruction of that town re- 
duced to ashes could not hasten its being taken a moment 
sooner. You could do no harm to our batteries, which were 
much higher than yours ; it is not by destroying houses 
that towns are taken. You always battered houses, with- 
out reflecting that it is only by ruining the fortifications — 
the defences — and by a breach in the walls, that success 
mav be hoped for in sieges ; audit is certain that you lavish^ 
ed a prodigious quantity of warlike stores very uselessly. 

What advantages could you expect by ruining and dis- 
tressing the inhabitants of Quebec, whose houses you burnt ? 

It w^as destroying alone for the pleasure of doing injury 
without any advantage accruing to you from it. 

Wolfe : — My inaction during the whole summer 
should have made you perceive wdiat little hopes I had of 
succeeding in my expedition ; should it turn out fruitless 
after the sum it had cost England, the news of Quebec being 
reduced to ashes might blind the extravagant English popu- 
lace, and blunt their fanatical fury. 

Montcalm :--The day that you landed at the Sault de 
Montmorency, where you encamped immediately with a 
body of four thousand men, in all appearance you did not 
know that the river Montmorency was fordable in the wood 
about a mile to the north of your camp, where fifty men in 
front might pass the ford with water only up to their knees. 
Had you passed it immediately, you might have fallen up- 
on the left of our army, cut them to pieces, and pursued 
them two miles, as far as the ravine of Beauport, before they 
could assemble a sufficient number of men to be able to re- 



L.oFC. 



12 

sist you. Yon might have even encamped upon the north 
side of that ravine, which, having it before you, would have 
been a very advantageous post, and brought you several 
miles nearer to Quebec. In this case it is highly probable 
that we would have been obliged to abandon to you all the 
o^round between the St. Charles river and the ravine. 

To return to my first project of encamping upon the 
heights of Abraham, our left was in the greatest security, 
not knowing that there was a ford in that river until some 
hours after your landing at the Sault. 

"Wolfe : — Is it then surprising that I should be ignor- 
ant of that ford, since you did not know it yourself? besides, 
it is only the inhabitants in the neighbourhood of rivers, 
swamps and lakes, who can give positive and sure informa- 
tion about them. And supposing I had found some of your 
Canadians at their houses there, they are so inviolably at- 
tached to their religion, king and country, that they would 
sooner have led me into a snare than instruct me in anything 
that could be i^rejudicial to their army. 

Those whom a general sends to examine the locale of a 
country must do it very superficially upon their own obser- 
vations, without consulting or interrogating the peasants in 
the neighbourhood. 

Montcalm : — Whilst your soldiers were employed in 
making their camp, and pitching their tents, M. de Levis 
and his aide-de-camp Johnstone, were looking at you from 
the opposite side of the Sault. His aide-de-camp having 
asked him if he was positively certain that there was no 
ford m the Montmorency river, M. de Levis answering that 
there was not, and that he had been himself to examine it 
to its source, at a lake in the woods, about ten or twelve 
miles from the Sault. An inhabitant who overheard this 
conversation, told the aide-de-camp : "The G-eneral is mis- 
taken ; there is a ford which the inhabitants thereabouts pass 



13 

every clay in carrying their corn to a mill ;" and he added 
that he had crossed it lately, with water not above his knees. 

The aide-de-camp related to M. de Levis immediately 
his conversation with the Canadian, who would not believe 
there was a ford, and, examining him roughly, the Canadian 
was seized with awe, and respect for the Greneral ; his ton- 
gue faltered in his mouth, and he durst not boldly assert the 
truth. The aide-de-camp, in a whisper to the Canadian, 
ordered him to find out a person who had crossed the ford 
lately, and bring him immediately to M, de Levis' lodgings. 
The Canadian came to him in a moment, with a man who 
had crossed it the night before, with a sack of wheat upon 
his back, where he had found only eight inches deep of 
water. 

The aide-de-camp being thus assured of the fact, order- 
ed, in M. de Levis' name, a detachment to be sent instantly 
with the necessary tools to intrench itself. 

Wolfe : — Had I been so lucky as you, sir, to discover 
that ford, there is no doubt I would not have let slip so 
favourable an opportunity of distinguishing myself, and 
would have fallen like lightning upon that part of your camp. 
There can be nothing more dangerous than the neighbour- 
hood of rivers and swamps, that have not been sounded and 
examined with the greatest care and attention. Negligence, 
ignorance and headstrong obstinacy are equally fatal in 
military affairs ; and the misfortune of a Lieutenant-Greneral, 
in Scotland, against the Highlanders at the battle of Pres- 
tonpans, made so deep an impression upon me that I am 
always on my guard when near such places. 

MoNTCA-LM : — How can you, sir, justify your imprudence 
in running headlong into the woods opposite to our in- 
trenchments, with two thousand men, who naturally ought 
to have been cut to pieces, and neither you nor any man of 
your detachment escape ? Nine hundred Indians had in- 
vested you all round at a pistol shot from you, and hud 



14 

already cut off your retreat, without your perceiving it. So 
soon as the Indians had surrounded you in the wood, they 
sent their officer Langlade to acquaint M. de Levis that they 
had got you in their net, but that your detachment, appear- 
ing to be about two thousand men, greatly superior to them 
in number, they begged earnestly of M. de Levis to order 
M. de Repentigny to pass the ford with eleven hundred 
men, which he commanded in these intrenchments, and 
join them ; that they would be answerable upon their heads 
if a single man of your detachment should get back to your 
camp ; and they did not think themselves strong enough to 
strike upon you without this reinforcement of Canadians. 
There were a great many officers at M. de Levis' lodgings 
when Langlade came to him on behalf of the Indians, and 
this General having consulted them, after giving his own 
opinion on the affair : " that it was dangerous to attack an 
" army in the wood, as they could not know the number of 
" men there ; that it might be all the English army, which 
" consequently might bring on a general engagement with- 
" out being prepared for it ; and that if he happened to be 
" repulsed, he would be blamed for engaging in an affair, 
" without holding previously an order from his superiors, 
" M. de Vaudreuil and M. de Montcalm." The oihcers re- 
spected too much the General not to be of his way of think- 
ing, and it must ever be so from flattery. His aide-de-camp 
alone maintained a different opinion, out of a real friend- 
ship for M. de Levis. He told them that there was not the 
smallest probability it could be all the English army, since 
the Indians, who never fail to magnify the number, com- 
puted th6m at only two thousand men. That even sup- 
posing it to be the whole English army, it would be the 
most lucky thing that could happen to us to have a general 
engagement in the woods, where a Canadian is worth 
three disciplined soldiers, as a soldier in a plain is worth 
t;hree Canadians ; and that nothing was more essential than 



15 

to select the propitious moment and the way of fighting 
for those who composed the two-thirds of the army, which 
was the case with the Canadians. On the contrary, the 
English array was almost entirely composed of regulars 
with very few militia. 

That M. de Levis could not do better than in ordering M. 
de Eepentigny to cross the river immediately with his de- 
tachment en echelon, and join the Indians, without losing 
moments very precious ; that at the same time he should 
send instantly to inform me of his adventure, in order to 
make all the army advance towards the ford, each regiment 
taking the place of the other marched off ; so that the Re- 
giment Royal Roussillon, the nearest to the ford, should go 
off directly to take the post that Eepentigny would quit in 
crossing the river, and observing the same for the rest of 
the army ; that by this means the engaging a general affair 
was much to be wished for, supposing all the English army 
to be in the woods opposite the ford ; in short, that if there 
was a possibility of our being defeated and repulsed in the 
woods, which could scarce happen, according to all human 
probability, we had our retreat assured in the depth of 
these woods, well known to the Canadians, where the Eng- 
lish troops could not pursue them, so that in no shape 
could M. de Levis run the least risk. 

His aide-de-camp tfdded, that when fortune offers her 
favours, " they ought to be snatched with avidity." These 
reasons made no impressions on M. de Levis, and Langlade 
was sent back to the Indians with a negative reply. 

There was two miles from M. de Levis' quarters to the 
place where the Indians were in ambush. Langlade came 
back with new entreaties and earnest solicitations to induce 
M. de Levis to make Eepentigny cross the ford with his 
detachment, but the General could not be prevailed upon 
to give a positive order to Eepentigny to join the Indians. 

He wrote a letter to Eepentigny by Langlade, wherein he 
told him *' having the greatest confidence in his prudence 



16 

and good conduoi, he might pa&s the rivei- with his de- 
tachment, if he saw a certainty of success." His aide-de- 
camp told him, whilst he was sealing the letter, that 
Eepentigny had too much judgment and good senscto take 
upon himself an affair of that importance ; and his opinion 
of Repentigny was immediately justified by his answer ; 
he asked M. de Levis to give him a clear and positive 
order. After thus loitering about an hour and a-half, M. 
de Levis resolved at last to go himself to the ford, and give 
there his orders verbally ; but he had scarce got half way 
to it when he heard a brisk lire. The Indians, losing all 
patience, after having remained so long hid at a pistol shot 
from you, like setter dogs upon wild fowl, at last gave you 
a volley, killed about a hundred and fifty of your soldiers, 
and then retired without losing a man. It is evident that 
had Eepentigny passed the river with his detachment of 
eleven hundred Canadians, you must have been cut to 
pieces, and that affair w^ould have terminated your expedi- 
tion. Your army could have no more hopes of succeeding 
after such a loss ; their spirits* would have been damped, 
and Canada would have been secure from any further in- 
vasion from Great Britain. 

Fortune was always as favourable to you, as she constant- 
ly frowned upon us. M. de Levis is not to be blamed ; an 
officer who serves under the orders of others can only be 
reproached when he does not execute punctually the orders 
he receives from his superiors ; and he has always reason 
to be cautious and diffident in such cases w^here his honour 
and reputation may be engaged, as none can be positively 
certain of the issue of any military enterprise, and if success 
does not crown the venture, of which you have voluntarily 
burthened yourself, though undertaken from the best of 
motives and apparently for the good of the service, thous- 
ands of mouths will open to spit venom against you. 

But of all others, the ignorant amongst the military, and 



11 

the knaves, to screen themselves, will surely be violent : 
this is so much the more astonishing, in |the profession of 
arms, where sentiments'of honour and honesty ought to be 
the foundation. 

Wolfe : — My intention in approaching so near your post 
at the ford was to examine it carefully, as I then had form- 
ed the design to attack it, little imagining^that such a con- 
siderable detachment as I had with me would have been 
exposed to be set on by your Indians. Accustomed to 
European warfare, I could never have thought^that a body 
of men should have been so long, so close to me without 
discovering them. Your intrenchments there appeared to 
be very trifling, but the sight of earth thrown up is respect- 
able, and not to be despised. 

Montcalm : — Your attack of the 31st of July, at the only 
place of our camp which was inaccessible, appeared to me 
unaccountable. From Quebec to Beauport, which was 
about four miles, it is a marshy ground, very^little higher 
than the surface of the St. Lawrence at full tide. The 
heights begin at the ravine at Beauport, and rise gradually 
all along'the^border of the river, until at * Johnstone's re- 
doubt and battery — where you made your descent and 
attack — they become a steep high hill, which^ ends in a 
deep precipice at the Sault de Montmorency. Opposite to 
Johnstone's redoubt it is so steep that your soldiers could 
scarce be able to climb it, even without the encumbrance 
of their^arms. 

Besides this natural fortification, we had a "[continued 
intrenchment all along the edge of the hill, from Beauport 
to the Sault, so traced and conducted by M. Johnstone that 
it was everywhere flanked, and the sloping of it served as 
a glacis ; thus the fire from the front and flanks would 
have destroyed the three-fourths" of your army 'before they 
could reach the top of the hill. 

2 



18 

But supposing that some of your troops had reached the 
top of the hill, up to our trenches, after surmounting these 
difficulties, my grenadiers were drawn up in battle behind 
them, ready to charge upon them, with their bayonets up- 
on their muskets, the instant any of your soldiers should 
appear at the trenches. 

The swampy, sinking ground, from the redoubt to the foot 
of the hill, was not one of the smallest difficulties you had 
in your way to come at us. 

It is true the Scotch Highlanders, who were your forlorn 
hope, had got over it and had reached the foot of the hill, 
though certainly very few returned ; but these turfy swamps, 
when a certain number of men have passed them, become 
at last impassible, and your soldiers must have sunk down 
in it above the head, multitudes of them perishing there in 
the most useless and disagreeable manner. Thus, sir, I hope 
you see clearly the folly and rashness of that attack, and 
that your army must have been totally destroyed, without 
hope, had not heaven wrought a miracle in your favor, after 
a long cessation of them, which alone could save you. 

You were no sooner hotly engaged in the attack, without 
a possibility of withdrawing yourself out of the scrape, when 
from a clear sunshine there fell in that most critical junc- 
ture, of a sudden, the most violent even, down pour of rain 
from a cloud, which, as the cloud that saved Eneas from 
the fury of Diomed, placed you immediately out of our 
sight, so that in an instant we could not see half way down 
the hill. You profited, as a wise man, of this event to make 
good your retreat. When the shower was over and we 
could see you, we found, to our sorrow, that you had es- 
caped us, and that you were then out of the reach of our lire, 
marching, in a. well-formed column, back to your camp at 
the Sault, well satisfied to have got out of that adventure 
with the loss only of between five and six hundred men. 

It was a long time before I could be persuaded that you 



19 

were in earnest. I had always expected your descent and 
attack would have been betwixt the St. Charles river and 
the ravine of Beauport. All that tract of ground, about four 
miles extent, was every where favourable to you, if you had 
made your real descent in the middle of it, opposite to M. 
Vaudreuil's lodging, with feint attacks at Johnstone's re- 
doubt, and at the Canardiere near the river St. Charles, 
forcing our intrenchments there, which could not resist an 
instant a well-formed column. The head of it, composed of 
the Scotch Highlanders, might have easily penetrated into 
the plain, separating our army into two parts by the centre, 
having lodged yourself in the south side of the ravine of 
Beauport, and have taken the hornwork upon the St. 
Charles river, sword in hand, without much difficulty or loss 
of men. In short, all this might have been effected in an 
hour's time, without meeting with any considerable resist- 
ance from our army, thus divided and opened, by the 
centre ; and a complete victory, which would have crushed 
us to pieces without hope, would have crowned you with 
justly merited laurels. 

Wolfe : — I own to you, sir, I was greatly deceived with 
regard to the height and steepness of the hill, which did 
not appear considerable, even with a telescope, from the 
river St. Lawrence ; it was only when I got to the redoubt 
that I saw it such as it really is. I began at seven in the 
morning to fire at your camp from my battery at the Sault 
(of forty cannons) mostly four-and-twenty pounders. The 
Centurion, a man-of-war of sixty guns, did the same, as also 
the Two Cats, which had on board all the tools necessary 
for the workmen. They gave you continually their broad- 
sides, firing upon your camp, as I did from my battery, like 
platoons of infantry. 

I dare say you never saw artillery better served and kept 
up until six in the evening when I began my landing at 
low water. I imasrined that this terrible cannonade all 



20 

that day, without a moment's intermission, would have in- 
timidated your Canadians and make them quit the trenches ; 
my battery at the Sault being thirty or forty feet higher 
than your camp, we saw them down at the shore. Certain- 
ly you must have lost a great number of men. 

Montcalm: — That brave militia deserves justly the 
greatest praise. Not a man of them stirred from his post, 
and they showed as much ardour, courage and resolution as 
my regular troops. I had no more than iifty men killed 
and wounded by your furious cannonade, which proves 
how little cannons are hurtful in comparison to the dread 
and respect they inspire. Permit me, sir, to tell you that 
your countrymen, the English, appear to me, from their con- j 
duct in Canada, to be as rash, inconsiderate and hot-headed 
as the French, who have ever enjoyed that character, not- 
withstanding your countrymen's reputation for coolness and 
phlegmatic bravery, since I have seen several examples of 
their attacking us before they had examined the Locale, or 
known our position ; and if the two nations are compared 
impartially, I am persuaded that you will do us the justice 
to own that in our operations in Canada we have shown 
much more circumspection and coolness than your English 
generals. Your attack of the 31st July, without having 
procured beforehand an exact knowledge of the hill and of 
the places adjacent, is not the first example of great temer- 
ity and impatience on their ])art. 

The proximity of your camp to this hill might have fur- 
nished you the means to have a thorough knowledge of our 
position, by sending proper persons to cross over the ford of 
the river Montmorency where it falls into the river St. Law- 
rence, and where it is fordable at low water. 

They might, in a dark night and bad weather, have not 
only examined the steepness of the height, but have even 
gone over all our camp without being discovered ; I always 
imagined you did so until the day of your attack, which 



21 

soon convinced me of the contrary. Your brother in arms, 
Abercrombie, your predecessor in the command of the army, 
committed the same fault at Ticonderoga as you did the 
31st of July ; but it cost him much dearer, the clouds which 
saved you not having come to his assistance. 

I set out from Montreal on the 5th of May, 1Y58, to go to 
Ticonderoga, with all my regular troops — the regiments of 
La Sarre, La Reine, Royal Rousillon, Berne, Gruienne, 
Languedoc, Berry of two battalions, and the independent 
companies of the marine detached in Canada ; the regiments 
from France not being recruited, the whole amounted to 
only about four thousand men. 

I had no positive information that the English army had 
formed the design to come by the lake St. Sacrament in order 
to attack Ticonderoga (Carillon), and from thence to go to 
Montreal — but I suspected it, from the proximity of this ford 
to your settlement upon lake St. Sacrament ; nor did I cease 
beseeching continually M. Vaudreuil, who was then at Que- 
bec, to send me with all possible diligence the Canadian 
militia, which was the principal force for the defence of the 
colony. 

M. Vaudreuil, who has neither common sense, nor judg- 
ment, could not find out that my military conjectures were 
grounded ; and instead of sending me the Canadians* he gave 
them permission to remain at Montreal, sixty leagues from 
Ticonderoga, to attend to their agricultural pursuits. 

I dare not allege that he was informed, by the Indians of 
the Iroquois nation, that the object of the English was to 
invade Canada ; that their army was on their way to lake 
St. Sacrament ; that it was with the view of sacrificing me. 
and making me the victim of a cabal, who led him and 
governed him blindly, that he kept from me the Canadians- 

The 7th of July my conjectures were verified by the ar- 
rival of the English army at the Chute, where lake St. Sacra- 
ment terminates, about four miles from Ticonderoga, con sis 



22 

ting of six thousand three hundred men, commanded by 
General Abercrombie, who had succeeded to General Brad- 
dock, killed the year before at the river Ohio. 

The return of a detachment which I had placed at the 
Chute, as an advanced post, who had lost an hundred and 
fifty men, killed by the English on their arrival there, was 
a sad confirmation of the bad news. It is scarce possible to 
imagine a more dangerous and critical situation than mine 
— without the aid of Canadians, whose way of fighting was 
so essential to me in the woods — more useful in those coun- 
tries than regular troops. Fort Carillon, or Ticonderoga,. 
was a square, regularly fortified, each face of it about seven- 
ty fathoms in length. 

It had four bastions — the walls of masonry, doubled with 
a rampart, as likewise a ditch, covered way, and glacis. M. 
de Bourlamarque, an officer of great merit and intelligence, 
had added a half moon to it. 

To retire with my four thousand troops would have been 
abandoning the colony to General Abercrombie, as the fort 
could not hold out long against so considerable an army ; 
and being on that side the key of Canada, with the posses- 
sion of it in the hands of the English, they might go direct- 
ly to Montreal, and be there in fifteen days, without find- 
ing on their way the least obstruction ; on the other hand, 
the match was very unequal in opposing four thousand 
men to thirteen thousand. There was, however, no room 
for hesitating, in the choice, and I was soon resolved to. 
save the colony by a bold and desperate stroke or die, glo- 
riously, sword in hand. I made everybody work hard all 
the night between the 7th and 8th July, cutting down 
trees to make an intrenchment (CCCC), which, when fin- 
ished, was very weak, trifling, and could scarce serve as a 
breast-work to cover the troops. 

The engineers, having cut off the branches, laid the trees 
upon a line on the heights, three or four of them placed 



23 

horizontally one upon the other, which scarce made it 
above three feet high — so low that your soldiers might 
easily have jumped over it ; — they made a line of the 
branches, at two paces distance, on the outside of the 
trenches (HH). It is certain that if the engineers had only 
thrown the trees with their heads outwards, and their 
branches sharpened in pricking points at their ends, it 
would have made a much stronger intrenchment, more 
difficult to be forced, and built much sooner.^ I had not 
the time to continue the trenches down to the hollow (DD), 
at the foot of the height, and I placed there two companies 
of grenadiers. 

The hollow upon the right of the height, where the in- 
trenchment was the worst of all my lines, was the post of 
the companies of marines (C) ; the regiments lined the rest 
of the trenches. Next day, the 8th of July, the English 
army appeared on the borders of the woods, about three 
hundred tathoms from the front of our intrenchment on the 
height, and instantly advanced to the attack, formed in 
three columns (EE), without halting a moment to examine 
the locale. Two of the columns attacked the height with 
the utmost impetuosity, but being very soon entangled 
among the branches, on the outside of the trenches, and 
impeded by them, they lost there a great many men ; some 
few got through and, jumping into our trenches, were kill- 
ed by our soldiers with their bayonets. 

The American riflemen were posted on two heights (GGr), 
which commanded our trenches, from whence they saw 
sideways in some parts of them, and in others the rear of 
the soldiers (K). 

The regiment of Berry was, above all others, worried and 
tormented by their fire — one of these heights being scarce 
above eighty paces from the intrenchments. The third 

* General Abei-crombie's army consisted of 6,000 regular troops and 7,000 
provincials, according to the English ; but the French gave them out to be 
0,300 troops, and 13,000 provincials— in all 19,300 men. 



24 

column attacked the hollow upon our right ; but receiving 
a brisk fire at its front from the colony troops, and at the 
same time upon its right flank from the regiments on the 
height, the column soon waA^ered, wheeled to the right, 
and, presenting its front to the height, got out of the reach 
of the fire from the right of the colony troops ; upon which 
M. Eaymond, who commanded them, went out of the 
trenches with the right wing of these troops, and attacked 
the left flank of the column, whilst its head and right flank 
were fired at from the height and from the left of the colony 
troops in the trenches. 

The column, distressed by this firing, yet, nevertheless, 
keeping firm at the foot of the height, put in disorder the 
regiment of Berry, who abandoned that part of the intrench- 
ment (II) above it. 

The moment I perceived the disorder, I ran there, en- 
couraged the soldiers of the regiment, made them return to 
their post, and supported them by the grenadiers, whom I 
had kept in order of battle, at a small distance from the 
trenches, as a reserve, to be employed wherever the line 
might be forced by your troops, to charge upon them head- 
long, their bayonets upon their muskets, without firing : 
having neg-lected nothing that the short time allpwed me 
to do, in order to make a vigorous defence — without aught 
to reproach myself with — had I been overpowered by your 
army ; and having always preserved coolness and presence 
of mind so as to be able to remedy immediately any disor- 
ders during this long and well disputed attack. 

Greneral Abercrombie was at last obliged to retire, after 
having continued for some hours, with the greatest obstin- 
acy, his attempt to force our intrenchments, — with the loss 
of two thousand men.^ 

I acquitted myself of my duty: this always afibrds a 
sweet satisfaction in all the events of life ; and, even to the 



The French say the English lost between four and five thousand men. 



25 

A'anquished and unfortunate, it must yield great comfort 
and consolation. I had only twelve hours to prepare to 
defend myself with five thousand men against thirteen 
thousand. 

How can General Abercrombie's rash and blind conduct 
be accounted] for, for attacking us without examining or 
knowing our position ? It is astonishing. 

During iwelve hours that he remained at the Chute after 
landing there, he had time to send and examine the ground 
round the fort Ticonderoga ; and they might have had a 
perfect knowledge of our position from a hill, covered 
vdth big trtes, on the opposite side of the river of the 
Chute (P) ; t this hill was much higher than any part of 
our intrenchments, and not a musket shot from them ; he 
might have gqie there himself with safety, having that 
river between is. 

Had he halted only a short time after his arrival on the 
borders of the Wood, about six hundred paces from our 
trenches, he might, even from thence, have examined the 
locale at his leisure But, seized with impatience, he hur- 
ried to^the attack vithout stopping there a moment — and 
it is not when an action is engaged that one can then ex- 
amine the enemy's josition ; or, if he had advanced upon 
us the moment of hislanding at the Chute, the Vth instant, 
instead of loitering there twelve hours, he would not have 
found even those sha\by intrenchments; and having so 
few (regular) troops, irrespective of the Canadians, I would 
have been obliged, on hii appearing, to abandon to him all 
that part^of the country, and retire to Montreal, leaving 
only a garrison at Fort Caillon. It was certainly through 
his ignorance of the locale hat I repulsed him, instead of 
being myself cut to pieces ; \ior had I any means of retreat, 
and^my troops must have beui all killed or taken prisoners, 



t Unfortunately, the plans here allyiecl to do not accompany the manus- 
cript. 



26 

if his third column had marched along the borders of the 
wood upon their left ; this would have put them out of the 
reach of the fire from the height, they could fall upon the 
right flank of the trenches of the colony troops, who could 
not have resisted a moment the impulse of the column ; 
instead of wheeling and changing its plan of attack by 
presenting its head to the height, had he always advanced 
forward to attack the centre of the intrenchmeits of the 
marine, he would have easily pierced througl it ; then, 
wheeling to the right, go up the height, which is there of 
an easy ascent, and fire upon the rear of the troops, who 
opposed your other two columns, they must have been j^ut 
to flight, the trenches abandoned, and, even rpon the sight 
of your third column coming up the height, I must, of ne- 
cessity, have instantly retreated to the fort the best way I 
could ; there to embark my army in my beats and carry it 
down Lake Champlaiu, without being ab'e to make a re- 
sistance at Fort Frederic, as it is commanded by hills be- 
hind it, about the distance of two hundred paces from its 
walls, which makes it a very advantageous post. What 
would have been still worse for me, i my trenches had 
been forced, there is a space of five leagues between Fort 
Frederic and Ticonderoga, by the rivec St. Frederic, which, 
about half way, is scarce above fifty rr sixty fathoms broad, 
and is a most advantageous post, -wnere not a boat would 
pass by, and must cut off entirely tie communication with 
lake Champlain, as it is an equal tistance from the Chute 
or from Ticonderoga. 

Greneral Abercrombie might hive sent a body of troops to 
establish there a post, in which <ase we must have laid down 
our arms and surrendered ou'selves prisoners to him, for 
want of subsistence, and fromthe impossibility of retreating 
by land. 

G-eneral Abercrombie mijht have likewise penetrated 
easily at the hollow, which I had not the time to intrench,, 



27 

where I had placed two companies of volunteers ; and this 
would have had equally fatal consequences for me, as the 
third column might have been on the other side of the height, 
the ascent there not being steep or of diificult access. 

But his attacks were always obstinately directed at the 
most difficult places of the height, as if there had been a 
cloud before his eyes to hinder him from seeing to his right 
and left what was visible to the most ignorant officer. 

Wolfe : — That was a most glorious day for you, sir, — wor- 
thy of the ambition of a great man. Our columns were 
only at ten. steps distance from your intrenchmeuts, and all 
our army saw you perfectly well, constantly at work en- 
couraging and exciting the ardour of your soldiers, hurrying 
over your lines perpetually some paces from your trenches ; 
exposing your person too rashly compared to the custom of 
our army, your eye glancing over the whole, with the atti- 
tude of a lion, (leneral Abercrombie perceived, clearly, the 
disorder upon your right when the regiment of Berry was 
about to retire, and redoubled his efforts to profit by it. But 
you were everywhere, travelling from place to place with 
the swiftness of the eagle ; never at a loss ; reforming the 
smallest disorder so soon as it was visible, and preventing 
it from spreading, as it generally does, like a flash of light- 
ning. This afiair w^on you so great a reputation in England 
for capacity and talent, that I own to you, sir, the idea of 
having an antagonist of your knowledge and merit, made 
me during the campaign always irresolute, vacillating in 
my opinions and undecided in my projects. I cannot con- 
demn my predecessors who had the command of the English 
armies in Canada. The way of fighting of the Canadians 
and Indians in the woods is so different from that practised 
in Europe, that I readily believe the most able G-eneral, 
with an army of the best disciplined troops, in following 
exactly the rules of the art of war, — whose principles are 
sure, fixed and demonstrable in European warfare, — may 



28 

be easily cut to pieces in those'vast forests by a very ^ few 
Indians. There was an outcry in England against G-eneral 
Braddock, for allowing^his army of four thousand men to 
be cut to^pieces at the river^Ohio,=^ in the year 1755, by six 
hundred and fifty Canadians and Indians only, much more 
than they blame General Abercrombie. 

The reason|of it is clear. Abercrombie lived to return 
to England : the living always find means to justify them- 
selves. But Braddock was killed : the dead are always in 
the wrong, and never find disinterested advocates to plead 
their cause. Braddock's order of march — criticised by your 
French G-enerals — may, at. first sight, appear singular ; and 
may pretend that he must of necessity have been beat, in 
consequence of the bad disposition of it. But analize it, 
and you will find nothing else than the common rule prac- 
tised through all Europe in passing through a wood : an 
army formed in three columns — the artillery, baggage, 
waggons and cavalry being the column of the centre, be- 
tween the other two columns of infantry ; half of the G-re- 
nadiers at their head to support the Pioneers employed in 
opening a road through the wood for the passage of the 
carts and artillery, and the rest in the rear, to close of 
march. Braddock was invested on all sides by the Cana- 
dians, and dispersed in the wood, each of them behind a 
tree, marking out his victim ; so that every musket-shot 
brought down a soldier,and at every discharge they flew from 
tree to tree. "What can regular troops do in such a case ? 
Close their ranks and files each moment, as did Braddock, 
direct a continual fire at the woods, without perceiving a 
man, and be cut to pieces without seeing an enemy. There 



* This contest is generally denominated the Battle of the Monongahela. 
Capt. Daniel Li6nard de Beaujeu commanded the Canadians, and achieved a 
most brilliant victory over General Braddock and George Washington ; the 
English losing their provisions, baggage, fifteen cannon, many small arms, the 
military chest, Braddock's papers. Washington, after the battle, wrote: 
" We have been beaten, shamefully beaten, by a handful of French." — (J. M. 
L.) 



29 

is no other method for troops to defend themselves against 
the Indians than what I practised, with success, when I 
was surprised by them at the ford of the River Montmor- 
ency : the soldiers, with fixed bayonets, dispersed them- 
selves, rushed on in disorder towards the places where they 
perceived the smoke of the Indians' discharge ; and by 
these means my detachment in the woods chased away your 
nine hundred Indians, who in a moment disappeared en- 
tirely, and suffered me to retire at my leisure to my camp. 

Montcalm: : — I verily beHeve, sir, that your idea is just. 
The Indians told me, on their return, that it was now no 
more possible to fight you as formerly, since the English 
had learned their (the Indians') way of fighting. There can- 
not be a greater advantage for a G-eneral than the entire 
knowledge of the country — the seat of war : without this, 
he must always grope in the dark — be foiled in his opera- 
tions — rest often inactive, uncertain in his projects ; and 
be only inactive and on the defensive, as you were all the 
summer as much as me. You were absolutely master of 
the River St. Lawrence by your men-of-war, who had as- 
cended it, passing by Quebec with incredible boldness, and 
scorning the most murderous fire from the batteries of the 
town so near them. You had an infinite number of boats 
at your disposal, with all the sailors of your fleet for rowers. 
What, then, could hinder you from sending a body of 
twelve or fifteen hundred men in different detachments, 
with engineers and able officers, in order to be continually 
landing, to get a thorough knowledge of the country, draw 
plans of all the advantageous positions which abound there ; 
and this detachment, if well led, might have gone even to 
Montreal without finding any opposition in their course. 
Their descriptions and plans of the country would have en- 
lightened you, and furnished the means of destroying and 
crushing our army without fighting : this is the touchstone 
to prove superior talents and capacity in a Greneial. The 



30 

gaining of a battle is very often the eflfect of mere chance. 
But reducing an enemy without fighting must be the re- 
sult of well-combined operations, — is the essence of military 
science, and was always the most radient and distinctive 
trait in the conduct and character of the great men whom 
history has handed down to us. Grounded upon the in- 
structions received from the engineers and officers of their 
detachments, you might have verified their observations by 
your prisoners, who say always more than they intend, 
when examined with kindness, coolness, and with a seem- 
ing indifference. The only achievement which you per- 
formed during two months that you lay constantly loiter- 
ing in your camps, looking at us, was your attack of the 
31st of July ; and your expedition to Deschambault, where 
you sent a body of two thousand men, fourteen leagues up 
the river from Quebec, to burn and pillage a poor, miserable 
peasant's house, in which was the baggage of some French 
regiments ! But the detachment had no intention of ex- 
amining the locale of the country. Had they gone to Jacques 
Cartier, only three leagues from Deschambault, they would 
have discovered there a post strong by nature, which cer- 
tainly cannot be inferior to the Thermopylse so celebrated 
by the Greeks, and capable of being defended — you being 
the masters of the River St. Lawrence — by as few men as 
Leonidas had with him against the most numerous army« 
But your detachment at Deschambault, upon the appear- 
ance of my calvary, composed merely of two hundred un- 
disciplined Canadians on horseback, commanded by the 
Chevalier de LaRochebeaucourt, ran to their boats and em- 
barked with great disorder and confusion, as if our army 
had been at their heels, without having remained there 
above two hours. Jacques Cartier — which takes its name 
from he who first discovered the River St. Lawrence, and 
who, having lost his ship, passed there the winter amongst 
the Indians — in an immense ravine, with a rapid, shaggy 



31 

river full of large rocks, that runs between the two heights, 
whose tops are about two hundred fathoms distant from 
each other ; their sides are as glacis, with a view from their 
tops to the bottom — four or five hundred feet deep — which 
strikes the eyes with horror on looking down that vast 
precipice. Its side, facing the River St. Lawrence, is a 
steep perpendicular rock ; and the ground to the north is 
impracticable from the lakes, swamps, and sinking turf, 
where at each step a person must plunge over the head and 
perish. It must be impossible to turn round it and leave 
it behind, since the Canadians and the Indians never dis- 
covered a passage through the woods. Thus the only- 
means of approaching this fort must have been by landing 
at Deschambault. From thence to Jacques C artier, it is an 
easy and gradually rising ascent. Had you seized this ex- 
traordinary fort, you would have cut oflf my communication 
with Montreal, from whence I drew daily my supplies for 
the army : in this event, I had no other alternative than 
allowing my army to perish 6f famine, or surrender the 
colony. But as we had been sent from Europe, not to 
destroy the inhabitants, but, on the contrary, to save and 
defend them, I must have immediately concluded by capi- 
tulating for Canada upon the best terms I could obtain 
from you. I. hope I have demonstrated clearly to you that, 
had you been acquainted with the locale, you could have 
made the glorious conquest of Canada without shedding a 
drop of blood. 

"Wolfe : — You argue, sir, at your ease ! How was it 
possible to examine and know the locale of that country, 
your bloodhounds — the Indians and Canadians — being 
constantly at our heels : one cannot send out scouts in Can-' 
ada, as is done in Europe. 

Montcalm : — Why not ? Men cannot be in two places 
at the same time ; and you managed to find everywhere 
Indians and Canadians in your way I There are many 



32 

kinds of irregular troops in Europe as bad to deal with as 
the Indians in woods and in wooded countries. But your 
army was always so struck with terror and dread, that, 
constantly blinded with fear, the shadow of an Indian set 
them a trembling. Nevertheless, the New England inde- 
pendent companies, formed by Roger, who afterwards beat 
the Indians with equal numbers in their own way of fight- 
ing behind trees, should have removed the formidable im- 
pression they have always made upon the English. Self- 
preservation is natural to all mankind, and the hour of death 
must strike with horror the bravest man. But fear is par- 
donable amongst soldiers only when there exists a real 
cause for fear ; and is not to be tolerated when groundless : 
this is so much the case of your soldiers with regard to the 
Indians, that, demoralized by fear, they suffer themselves to 
be butchered by a vastly inferior number of Indians, with- 
out ever thinking of defending themselves, even when 
they know they will have no quarter. In any danger, 
soldiers ought to be accustomed to look coolly death in 
the face, — they, whose duty is to die when the Sovereign 
demands it : such is the contract they sign with the latter 
on their entering into his service. 

These sentiments may be often the means of one's pre- 
serving life instead of losing it. Nothing is more incom- 
prehensible to me, in all your conduct in Canada, than 
your landing at Anse des Meres on the 13th September (the 
fatal day which deprived us both of our existence, but 
freed us from mortal folly), at the foot of a steep hill, where 
a few men at the top of it, with sticks and stones only, 
must have easily beaten you back on your attempt to climb 
it, and where we had three posts of one hundred men 
each : one of them commanded by Douglas, captain in the 
regiment of Languedoc ; another by Rimini, captain in the 
regiment La Sarre ; and the third by De Vergor, captain in 



8S 

the Colony troops, at whose post ^ you made your descent. 
These three hundred men, had they done their duty, 
should have been more than sufficient to have repulsed 
you ignominiously at this steep hill ; and you never would 
have got to the top had you met with the smallest resist- 
ance. I own that your daring surpasses my conception. 

Wolfe: — I do not pretend to justify my project by its 
success, but by my combinations, which answered exactly 
as I had foreseen, and which demonstrate my scheme to 
have been w^ell concerted. In giving you this account of 
it, I am persuaded that you will not blame me for under- 
taking an attempt so absurd in appearance, and yet most 
reasonable when examined impartially. In all expeditions 
composed of sea and land forces, it seldom fails that dis- 
putes, animosities, jealousies and quarrels arise between 
the different commanders equal in authority ; and it is a 
miracle if you see the Admiral and the General unanimous- 
ly of the same opinion with regard to operations. The sea 
and the land service are sciences whose principles are en- 
tirely different ; as certainly there can be no analogy be- 
tween the working of a ship and the drill of a regiment. 
Nevertheless, the Admiral meddles continually with the 
land operations, and the Greneral will have the fleets do 
things that are impossible — both of them equally ignorant 
of each other's service ; from whence results a clashing dis- 
cord in their operations, when sent out with equal power. 
If each of them w^ould confine himself to that part of the 
art of war which he has studied, and have only in his soul 
the good and welfare of his King and Country, these mixed 
expeditions of land and sea would succeed much better 
than they generally do. The naval officers tormented me 
a great deal, and were still more troublesome as the season 
advanced. They held a council of war on board the flag- 

* De Vergor's post apparently stood about a 100 yards to the east of the 
spot on which Wolfe's Field-cottage has since been built. The ruins still exist, 
~{,J. M. L.) 

s 



84 

ship on the 10th September, when it was determined to set 
sail immediately for Europe, seeing the imminent dangers 
to which His Majesty's fleet would be exposed in those 
tempestuous seas by remaining any longer before Quebec ; 
and, in consequence of this decision, orders were given to 
some men-of-war to take up their anchors and fall down 
the river, while orders were issued at the same time to be- 
gin the general preparations for the immediate departure 
of all the fleet. The 12th, there came two deserters to me 
from one of your three posts you just now mentioned, who 
belonged to the French regiments, and were well informed. 
Upon examining them, I discovered that your posts were 
guarded very negligently; that de Bougainville, who was 
at Gap Rouge, proposed to send down, the night following, 
some boats loaded with provisions, and that your three 
posts had their orders to let these boats pass unmolested. 
Tne idea instantly occurred to me to profit by this discovery ; 
and I ran to the Admiral, communicated to him what I had 
learned from the French deserters, begged him most 
earnestly to suffer me to make a last attempt before the 
embarkation of my army. I promised him that if there 
were twenty muskets fired from your posts, I would then 
desist immediately without further thought than to embark 
speedily in order to return to England. The council 
consented to my demand, and I began my landing at 
eleven at night. "When my boats approached the _^ two 
posts of Douglas and Rimini, upon their sentinels calling 
*' Qui vive ! " my soldiers answered them in French, 
" Bateaux des vivres, " upon which they suffered them to 
go on without stopping them, as they might have done, in 
order to receive the password. Not finding a sentry at 
your third post, commanded by De Vergor, I landed there 
with diligence, and all my army was ashore before this 
post perceived our men, without firing but one musket, 
which wounded De Vergor in the heel, who was imme- 



35 

diately taken prisoner without finding any man of his 
detachment with him. ^ I began my operation by landing 
there a Sergeant with ten Grrenadiers, ordering him to 
advance always straight before him briskly, with long 
steps, and not to halt unless he was discovered by the 
enemy. A Lieutenant, with a detachment of Grenadiers, 
followed him, having the same orders, to halt instantly if 
they fired at him. The silence continuing, I then landed 
all my Grrenadiers, who followed the Sergeant and the 
Lieutenant ; and by degrees all my army landed without 
the least noise, disorder or confusion. The silence soon 
convinced me that they were not discovered ; dissipated 
my fears, and assured me ot the success of my enterprise. 
The head of the column, which was the guide to the rest 
of the army, got up the hill with difficulty, the others 
following them at their heels. If your guards had been 
vigilant and done their duty, all I risked was the Sergeant 
and Lieutenant, with a few Grenadiers. I would have 
stopped at the first discharge, as it would have been 
madness and unpardonable to attack by main force a hill 
so inaccessible that, even without an enemy at the top to 
repel them, my men had much difficulty to climb it. 
Moreover, I was assured by your deserters you had no 
troops on the heights of Abraham. You see now, sir, that 
it was not a heedless, ill-concerted project, — but a sure 
operation, without risking much. An invariable principle 
with me has ever been to make an attack where it appears 
the most difficult ; and it generally meets with success, as 
the point is commonly ill-guarded, frequently entirely 
neglected, and scarcely comprehended in the plan of 
defence. I am not alone of this opinion. Cardinal Ximenes 
says, that " Ferdinand, King of Arragon, fitted out two 

* De Vergor's guard was composed chiefly of Militiamen from Lorette, 
who on that day had obtained leave to go and work on their farms, provided 
they also ^worked on a farm Captain De Vergor owned. — " Jk ^moires sur let 
Affaires de la Colonic de 1749-6U. " Some historians have intimated that D© 
Vergor— 9, protege ot Bigot's— was a traitor to hia King.— (J. M. L.) 



" armies against the Moors, under the conduct of Count 
" D'Aguilar, and ordered them to enter into the mountains 
*' of Grenada at the same time, by the places the most 
" difficult, " and consequently the least guarded. He gained 
a most complete victory over tho Moors. The most difficult 
gorges of mountains, when not guarded vv'here only a 
single man can pass, a hundred thousand may do the 
same. It is then an easy operation, by forming your men 
in battle as soon as they get through the passage, and 
provided that they are not immediately discovered by the 
enemy. When once you have a front capable to oppose 
and stand lirm, it increases every instant, as you may be 
convinced that the soldiers go through the dangerous 
passage with great quickness. Besides, the enemy is always 
disconcerted by a surprise ; demoralized by an unforeseen 
incident, he becomes timid and alarmed, and may be 
looked upon as already vanquished before the action 
begins. The landing at Cap Breton was executed accord- 
ing to my system. The enemy does not expect you at 
a place of difficult access ; it is where he does not 
expect me that I would make my principal attack. Com- 
monly, men suffiir most where they are most soen.^ But 
if they are entirely neglected — as it happened at Louis- 
bourg — it is a fault of the Greneral, who should be answer- 
able for it. But the General having placed upon them a 
sufficient number of troops in proportion to their difficulties, 
can he be blamed il the officers of these posts do not do 
their duty ? 

Montcalm : —Can there be any divine or human law to 
punish a man for the faults of others ? Should they not 
answer personally ? It has often happened that the safety 
of a whole army has depended upon a subaltern's guard ! 



* I incline more to General Wolfe's opinion than what Voltaire reports in 
the war of 1781, to have been the King of Prussia's maxim: — "That we 
ought always to do what the enemy is afraid of. " W here the enemy is afraid 
of anything in particular, he has there his largest force, and is there more on 
hia guard than any where else, — (Manuscript Note,) 



37 

You see that the deserters caused you to make a last 
attempt — prevented your embarking your army for England 
—your giving up your enterprise— and, in short, ended in 
adding Canada to the British dominions ; and perhaps a 
vigilant officer a that post (Wolfe's Cove) might have 
hindered the soldiers from deserting, which would at once 
have removed a first cause which produced so many 
extraordinary effects. Your system may be good, if executed 
with great prudence and precaution. But should the 
enemy be informed of your design, which he may be by a 
deserter acquainted with your great preparations, as you 
where with the negligence of our posts, it is an excellent 
opportunity to have your army cut to pieces and catch a 
tartar ; as it must have been your case at the Sault de 
Montmorency (on the 31st July), had it not been for that 
sudden shower of rain, which came to your rescue in the 
critical moment, when your destruction was otherwise 
inevitable. At least, sir, confess the injustice of mankind. 
They reproach me with being the cause of your success ! 
They accuse me of having sacrificed the welfare of my 
army through jealousy and ill-feeling ! My king and 
country — for whom 1 would have shed, with pleasure, 
every drcp of my blood — and those who view my case 
th3 most favourably, look on me as a giddy, ignorant 
o3icer ! All these scandalous, atrocious lies and calumnies 
w^re spread everywhere by a set ^ of men who, from their 
immoderate thirst of riches, would, to serve their interest, 
have betrayed their king and country Those vile, mercenary 
souls knew that I detested them as much as I constantly 
cherished honest men, whose noble sentiments endeared 
ihem to me. My death was happy for them. Had I lived 
to return to Europe, I would have had no difficulty to 
justify all my conduct, and crush these wretches like 
vermin. Covetousness and avarice carried them to Canada ; 



Bigot's coterie. — (J. M.L.) 



88 

they left their honour and honesty in France on embarking, 
easily forgetting what it is to be just and patriotic. I would 
have soon confounded them. Truth supports oppressed 
innocence, and, sooner or later, dispels the clouds which 
too often overshadow it. I shall give yon a faithful and 
exact account of my conduct with regard to the operations 
of the 13th September, following scrupulously truth, which 
has always been the rule of my actions and is held in great 
veneration by me ; and I hope to demonstrate to you that 
if the end of that campaign covered you with glory, Fortune 
was the chief agent, who reunited in your power a great 
number of circumstances, the absence of any one of which 
sufficed to render your expedition fruitless. 

Some days after the action of the 31st of July, M. de 
Levis was sent by M. Vaudreuil to command at Montreal, 
upon a false report that a body of English was coming to 
attack Canada by Lake Champlain — a story trumped up by 
my enemies to deprive me of M. de Levis, in whom I had 
the greatest confidence, on account of his talents : I cannot 
say he made me a just acknowledgment of my sentiments 
towards him. I went to his lodgings a few hours before 
his departure, which was kept a secret from the army ; 
and as I was little acquainted with his plan of defence for 
the left of our camp, at the Sault de Montmorency, I begged 
of him, as a favour, to leave me his aide-de-camp, M. 
Johnstone, who had a perfect knowledge of the locale of 
that part of the country. Your boats having caused us an 
alarm in the night between the 10th and 11th of September, 
by their appearance opposite to the ravine of Beauport, I 
remained at M. Vaudreuil's until one in the morning, 
when I lelt him in order that I might return to my lodging 
— having with me M. Montreuil, Major-General of the 
army, and M. Johnstone. On my sending away M. de 
Yaudreuil, after giving him my orders, I related immediately 
to M. Johnstone all the measures I had concerted w^ith M. 



39 

de Vaudreuil, in case you (G-on. Wolfe) made a descent at 
daybreak. He answered me, that your army beina: now 
assembled at Point Levi, and part of it gone above Quebec, 
on the south side of the River St. Lawrence, it appeared 
very doubtful where you might attempt a descent — 
whether above the town, or below it towards the Canaidiere ; 
he added, that he beheved a body of troops might be 
advantageously placed upon the heights of Abraham, where 
they could with certainty confront you whenever you 
landed. I approved greatly of his idea. I called back 
Montreuil — who was as yet not far from us — and I ordered 
him to send the Regiment of Guienne — which was encamped 
near the hornwork at the River St. Charles — to pass the 
night upon the heights of Abraham. Next morning — the 
11th — 1 wrote to Montreuil, ordering him to make this 
regiment encamp upon the heights of Abraham, and 
remain there until further orders. Thus, in consequence 
of my repeated orders, I had all the reason possible to 
believe that this regiment conslitued a permanent post 
there ; so that the declaration of the deserters from the 
three posts, who could not know this, might have led you 
into a dangerous snare, worse than that of the 31st July. 
Why this regiment continued the 12th in this camp at the 
hornwork, in spite of my express orders to encamp upon 
the heights, I know not ; and can only attribute Montreuil's 
disobedience of my orders to the weakness of his judgment 
and understanding. It is nevertheless evident that, if you 
had found the Regiment of Guienne upon the top of the 
hill — where it ought to have be(m, had my orders been 
obeyed — you would have been repulsed shamefully with a 
much greater loss than you met with on the 31st July at 
the Sault ; the height where you made your descent, the 
13th of September, being infinitely steeper than that there 
which obliged you to make a speedy retreat, favoured by 
the providential shower. Or, perhaps you would have 



40 

Embarked immediately your army, without any further 
attempt, to return to England, after a most ruinous and 
fruitless expedition-the campaign ending with an incredible 
expense to your nation— fruitless ; and, by this means, the 
colony of Canada would have been for ever delivered from 
such formidable armies. 

As soon as your army was reunited in a single camp at 
Pointe Levi, after having been so long separated, upon you 
sending a body of troops up the River St. Lawrence, I 
detached M. de Bougainville, with fifteen hundred of my 
best troops— composed of all my Grenadiers, of the 
Volunteers from the French Regiments, of my best Cana- 
dians and Indians ; and I likewise gave him some small 
guns. I ordered him strictly to follow all your movements, 
by ascending the river when you went up, and descending 
as you did the same : in short, to be an army of observation, 
with only the river between you — never to lose sight of 
you — ever ready to oppose your passage up the river, and 
to fall on you with the swiftness of the eagle the moment 
you attempted to land on our side of it. He sent to inform 
me, the 13th of September, that all your army had descended 
to your camp at Pointe Levi. But he remained loitering 
with his detachment at Cap Rouge — three leagues from 
Quebec ! "Why did he not follow you to the heights of 
Abraham, according to his orders ? Why did he not send 
me back my Grenadiers and Volunteers — the very flower 
of their Regiments ? informing me, as also the posts of 
Douglas and Rimini, that he would send down that night. 
I cannot conc*^ive the reasons for such conduct : it is beyond 
all conception ! He was informed, between seven and 
eight in the morning, by the fugitives from the three posts, 
that your army was landed and drawn up in battle upon 
the heights of Abraham ; upon which he left Cap Rouge 
with his detachment, no doubt wuth the intention to join 
me. But, instead of taking the road to Lorette, or to the 



41 

General Hospital along the borders of the River St. Charles, 
which led both of them to our camp, he followed the heights 
of Abraham, where he was evidently certain by his infor- 
mation to find there your army to intercept him ; and it 
could never be his design to fight you with fifteen hundred 
men ! He found a house on his way, with three or four 
hundred of your troops barricading it, and was very desirous 
to take them prisoners. M. le Noir, Captain in the Regi- 
ment La Sarre — having more bravery than prudence and 
knowledge of the art of war — attacked the house with the 
most astonishing boldness, and had more than half of his 
company of Volunteers killed : he received himself two 
wounds — one of them by a ball through the body, and the 
other in his hand. De Bougainville, intent on taking the 
house, waited there the arrival of the cannon, to force it ; 
but when the cannon arrived, it unluckily happened that 
the balls had been forgotten at Cap Rouge, which obliged 
him to return there, abandoning the house without a 
moment's reflection. How much more important it would 
have been to direct his march towards the General Hospi- 
tal, in order to join my army ! Thus were precious mo- 
ments wasted ridiculously in the most trifling manner. De 
Bougainville — who has a great deal of wit, good sense, 
many good qualities — was protected by a very great person 
at Court ; he is personally brave, has but little knowledge 
in the military science, having never studied it. 

The night between the 12th and 13th of September, when 
you made your descent, M. Poularies, Commander of the 
Regiment Royal Roussillon, who encamped behind my lodg- 
ings at Beauport, came to me, at midnight, to inform me that 
they saw boats opposite to his regiment. Upon which I im- 
mediately ordered all the army to line the trenches ; and I 
sent Marcel — who served me as Secretary and aid-de-camp 
— to pass the night at M. de Vaudreuil's, giving him one of 
my Cavaliers of Ordnance, ordering Marcel, if there was anyr 



42 

thing extraordinary in that quarter, to inform me of it speed* 
ily by the Cavalier. I was out and walked with Poularies 
and Johnstone, between my house and the ravine of Beau- 
port, until one in the morning, when I sent Poularies to his 
regiment, and I continued there with Johnstone. All night 
my mind was in the most violent agitation, which I believe 
proceeded from my uneasiness for the boats and provisions 
that de Bougainville had acquainted me, would be sent down 
the river that night ; and I repeated often to Johnstone, that 
I trembled lest they should be taken, " that loss would ruin 
"us without resource, having provisions only for two days' 
" subsistence to our army." It appears to me that my extra- 
ordinary sufferings that night were a presage of my cruel 
fate some hours afterwards. At daybreak they fired some 
cannon from our battery at Samos, near Sillery, I then had 
no more doubts of our boats being taken by you. Alas! I 
would never have imagined that my provisions were in 
safety at Cap Rouge with de Bougainville, and that you were 
upon the heights of Abraham since midnight, without my 
being informed of an event of so great importance, and which 
was known through all the right of our camp. 

The day clearing up, having news Iroro Marcel at M. de 
Yaudreuil's, who had always my Cavalier of Ordnance with 
him, and perceivinir no changes in your camp at Point Levis, 
my mind was more composed on reflecting that, if anything 
extraordinary had happened, I would certainly have been 
informed of it. I then sent Johnstone to order all the army 
to their tents, having passed the night in the trenches, and 
retired to my lodgings after drinking some dishes of tea with 
Johnstone. I desired him to order the servants to saddle 
the horses, in order to go to M. de Vaudreuil's and be inform- 
ed of the cause of the firing from our battery at Samos. Not 
a soul having come to me from the right of our camp since 
midnight when 1 sent there Marcel, I set out with Johnstone 
between six and seven in the morning. Heavens, what was 
my surprise ! when opposite to M. de Vaudreuil's lodgings, 



43 

tho first news of what had passed during the night was the 
sight of your army upon the heights of Abraham, firing at 
the Canadians scattered amongst the bushes. I met at the 
same lime M. de Vaudreuil coming out of his lodgings, and 
having spoke to him an instant, I turned away to Johnstone, 
and told him: "the affair is serious! run with the greatest 
" speed to Beauport ; order Poularies to remain there at the 
" Tvavine with two hundred men, and to send me all the rest 
"of the left to the heights of Abraham with the utmost dili- 
" gence." 

Johnstone having delivered my orders to Poularies, he 
quitted him an instant to give some instructions to my ser- 
vants at my lodgings ; returning to rfjoin me, he found 
Poularies in the Ravine with M. de Sennezergue, Brigadier- 
General and Lieutenant-Colonel of the Eegiment of La Sarre, 
and deLotbiniere, Captain of the Colony troops and aide-de- 
camp to M. de Vaudreuil. Poularies stoppad Johnstone to 
make him repeat to them my orders, which he did ; and at 
the same time advised Poularies, as a friend, to disobey them, 
by coming himself to the heights of Abraham with every 
man of the left, since it was evident that the English army 
— already landed near Quebec — could never think of make- 
ing a second descent at Beauport ; and that it was manifest 
there would be in a few hours an engagement upon the 
heights which would immediately decide the fate of the 
Colony. Poularies then showed Johnstone a written order 
— signed "Montreuil" — which Lotbiniere had brought to him 
from M. de Vaudreuil, " That not a man of the left should 
stir from the camp !" Johnstone declared to them, upon his 
honour, that it was word for word my orders and my inten- 
tions ; and he entreated Poularies, in the most pressing 
manner, to have no regard for that order signed '' Montreuil," 
as the want of two thousand men, which formed the left of 
our camp, must be of the greatest consequence in the battle, 
M. de Sennezergue —an officer of the greatest worth and 



44 

honour, who fell a few hours afterwards — told Johnstone : 
" That he (Johnstone) should take it upon him to make all 
" the left march of immediately." Johnstone answered : 
" That, being only the bearer of ray orders, he could take 
*' nothing upon him. But if he was in M. de Sennezergue's 
"place, Brigadier-General, and, by M. de Levis' absence, the 
"next in command of the army, he would not hesitate amo- 
*' ment to make the left march, without any regard whatso- 
" ever to any order that might be hurtful to the King's ser- 
"vice, in that critical juncture." Johnstone left them irre- 
solute and doubtful how to act, clapped spurs to his horse, 
and rejoined me immediately upon the heights. 

I don't know, any more than a thousand others, the par- 
ticulars relative to the action of the 13th of September. I 
am ignorant of who it was that made our army take their 
abominable and senseless position, by thrusting it betwixt 
your army and Quebec, where there were no provisions, and 
the best of our troops absent with de Bougainville ; it cer- 
tainly must have been dictated by an ignorant and stupid 
blockhead ! I certainly had no hand in it : the piquets and 
part of the troops were already marched up the heights be- 
fore I came to the Canardiere, or ever knew that you were 
landed ; and all the right of our army was marching after 
them when I arrived at their encampment. The only pro- 
per course to be taken in our position, and which would 
have been apparent to any man of common sense who had 
the least knowledge of the art of war, was to quit our camp 
coolly — calmly — without disorder or confusion, and march 
to Lorette ; from thence cross over to St Foix — which is two 
leagues from Quebec and a league from Cap Rouge — and 
when joined there by M. de Bougainville's detachment, to 
advance then and attack you as soon as possible. By these 
means you would have found yourself between two fires, by 
a sally from the town the moment that I attacked you on 
the other side. 1 was no sooner upon the heights than I 



45 

pel-ceived our horrible position, — pressed against the towh* 
walls, without provisions for four-and-twenty hours, and a 
moral impossibility for us to retire, being drawn up in bat- 
tle at the distance of a musket-shot from your army. Had 
I made an attempt to go down the heights, in order to repass 
the Eiver St. Charles and return to my camp, I would have 
exposed my left flank to you, and my rear would have been 
cut to pieces without being able to protect and support it. 
Had I entered into the town, in an instant you would have 
invested us in it, without provisions, by carrying down ^our 
left wing to the River St. Charles — an easy movement of a 
few minutes. I saw no remedy other for us than to worry 
your army by a cannonade, having the advantage over you 
of a rising ground suitable for batteries of cannon, hoping, 
by thus harassing you, that you might retire in the night, 
as certainly you could never be so rash as to think of attack- 
ing us under the guns of the town ; at least I would have 
made my retreat, taking advantage of the darkness of the 
night, to get myself out of the scrape where the ignorance 
of others had thrown me. I sent several persons with orders 
to M. de Ivamsay, Kings Lieutenant (Deputy Governor), 
who was in command at Quebec, to send me, with all pos- 
sible haste, the five-and-twenty brass field pieces that were 
in position on the palace battery, near our army ; and pre- 
cisely at the same instant when Johnstone came to me on 
the heights, wuth the news of the order which prevented 
the left of our army to join me, a sergeant arrived from M. 
de Eamsay — the fourth person I had sent to him with my 
orders — with a categorical answer from him : *' That he had 
" already sent me three pieces of artillery ; and that he could 
" not send me any more, having his town to defend !" What 
could be de Ramsay's reasons for such a monstrous conduct, 
or who it was who inspired him with such a daring disobe- 
dience, I know not ? 
1. " His town"— as he called it— was defended by our 



46 

army which covered it, being drawn up in battle about two 
hundred fathoms from it; and its safety depended entirely 
upon the event of a battle. 

2. There were in Quebec about two hundred pieces of 
cannon, most of them twenty-four and thirty-six pounders. 

3. Small field-pieces, two or three pounders — such as the 
palace battery — could they be of the least service for the de- 
fence of a town ? 

4. A commander of Quebec, as King's Lieutenant or sub- 
Lieutenant, such as de Ramsay was — not Governor, — or 
even M. de Vaudreuil himself, Governor General of Canada, 
at that moment in the town, — could they have any authori- 
ty to refuse me all the assistance I could desire from Quebec, 
by my particular commission of Commander-in-rhief of the 
troops in Canada, when my army was at the gates of the town, 
and your army deployed ready to fight ? A thousand other 
queries suggest themselves ; but of what avail ? 

I assembled immediately a council of war, composed of all 
the commanding officers of the several regiments, to hear 
their opinion as to what was to be done in our critical situa- 
tion. Some of them maintained you were busy throwing 
up breastworks. Others, that you appeared bent on descend- 
ing in the valley, in order to seize the bridge of boats on the 
St. Charles river with the hornwork, with the object of cut- 
ting off our communication with the left wing of our army, 
which remained at Beauport pursuant to the order signed by 
Montreuil. In effect, a movement your army made in that 
moment towards the windmill and Borgia's house, upon the 
edge of the height, seemed to favour this conjecture. But 
an instant afterwards, the Canadians having set fire to that 
house and chased you from it, you retook your former po- 
sition. Others alleged, that the more we delayed attacking 
you, the more your army would be strong — imagining that 
your troops had not yet all landed. In short, there was 
uot a single member of the war council who was not of 



47 

opinion to charge upon you immediately. Can it be cre- 
dited that these officers — to the dishonour of mankind — 
who were the most violent to attack yoi3, denied it after- 
wards, and became the most ardent censors of my conduct 
in not deferring the battle ! What could I do in my des- 
perate situation ? Even a Marshal Turenne would have 
been much puzzled to get out of such a dilemma, in which 
they had entangled me either through design or ignorance. 
I listened with attention to their opinion, without opening 
my lips, and at last answered them : — " It appears to me, 
" gentlemen, that you are unanimous for giving battle ; 
" and that the only question now is, how to charge the 
" enemy ?" Montreuil said it would be better to attack in 
columns. I answered him : " That we would be beat be- 
" fore our columns could be formed so near to the enemy ; 
" and, besides, that our columns must be very weak, not 
" having Grenadiers to place at their heads." I added, that 
" since it is decided to attack, it must be in Front Bau- 
" diere (?)" I sent all the officers to their posts, and order- 
ed the drummers to beat the charge. 

Our onset was neither brisk nor long. We went on in 
confusion — were repulsed in an instant ; and it could not 
naturally be otherwise from the absence of our Volunteers 
and Grenadiers, and de Bougainville at Cap Rouge with 
the best of our Canadians ; the Montreal regiments with 
Poularies at Beauport, a league and a half from the battle- 
field. The example of the bravest soldiers in a regiment — 
the Grenadiers and Volunteers — suffices to infuse courage 
in the most timid, who can follow the road shown to them, 
but cannot lead the way. The brave Canadian Militia saw 
us with heavy hearts, grief and despair, from the other side 
of the St. Charles river, cut to pieces upon the heights, 
stopped, as they were, in the hornwork, and prevented by 
superior orders from rushing to our assistance. About two 
hundred brave and resolute Canadians rallied in the hollow 



48 

at the bakehouse, and returned upon the heights. They 
fell instantly upon your left wing with incredible rage ; 
stopped your army for some minutes from pursuing our 
soldiers in their flight, by attracting your attention to them ; 
resisted, undaunted, the shock of your left ; and, when re- 
pulsed, they disputed the ground inch by inch from the 
top to the bottom of the height, pursued by your tooops 
down to the valley at the bakehouse, opposite to the horn- 
work. These unfortunate heroes — who were most of them 
cut to pieces— saved your army the loss of a great many 
men, by not being hotly pursued ; and if your left, who 
followed these two hundred Canadians down to the plain, 
had crossed it from the bakehouse to the River St. Charles, 
only three or four hundred paces, they would have cut off 
the retreat of our army, invested the three-fourths of them 
in Quebec, without provisions, and M, de Vaudreuil, next 
day, must have surrendered the town and asked to capitu- 
late for the colony. But your conduct cannot be blamed, 
as it is always wise and prudent in giving — as Pyrrhus 
advises — a golden bridge to one's enemy in flight. 

You see, sir, by this true and faithful account of the 
battle of the 13th September, and of w^hat preceded it, how 
many different and unforeseen events, fortune was obliged 
to unite in your favour to render you successful in your 
expedition against Canada ; the failure of any one of which 
would have sufficed to frustrate your enterprise. It would 
appear that heaven had decreed that France should lose 
this colony. Let us now conclude, sir, that I have as little 
deserved the blame, scorn, contempt and injustice which 
my country heaped on my memory, as you do the excessive 
honours they lavished on your's in England ; and that the 
ablest Greneral in Europe, placed in my circumstances, 
could not have acted otherwise than I did. Moreover, I 
was under M. de Vaudreuil — the weakest man alive, al- 
though a most obstinate automaton — and could not freely 



49 

follow my ideas as if I had been Commander-in-Chief. In 
my country the law is equal : we neither punish, nor re- 
compense. 

The Marquis of Montcalm, endeavouring- to rally the 
troops in their disorderly flight, was wounded in the lower 
part of the belly. "^ He was conveyed immediately to Que- 
bec, and lodged in the house of M. Arnoux, the King's sur- 
geon, who was absent with M. de Bourlamarque : his 
brother — the younger Arnoux — having viewed the wound, 
declared it mortal. This truly great and worthy man heard 
Arnouxf pronounce his sentence of death with a' firm and 
undaunted soul : his mind calm and serene ; his counte- 
nance soft and pleasing ; and w'ith a look of indifference 
whether he lived or died. He begged of Arnoux to be so 
kind and outspoken as to tell him how many hours he 
thought he might yet live ? Arnoux answered him, that 
he might hold out until three in the morning. He spent 
that short period of life in conversing with a few officers 
upon indifferent subjects with great coolness and presence 
of mind, and ended his days about the hour Arnoux had 
foretold him. His last words w^ere : — " I die | content, 



* It was reported in Canada, that the ball which killed that -great, good 
and honest man, was not fired by an English mnsket. But I never credited 
this. 

t Arnoux gave me this account of liis last momerits. — Manuscript Notes. 

+ The place where Montcalm died appears yet shrouded in doubt. It is 
stated, in Knox's Journal, that, on being wounded, Montcalm was conveyed 
to the General Hospital, towards which the French sfj^uadrons in reti-eat had to 
pass to regain, over the bridge of boats, their camp at Beauport. The General 
Hospital was also the head-quarters of the wounded — ])oth English and French. 
It has been supposed that Arnoux 's house, where Montcalm was conveyed, 
stood in St. Louis street. No where does it appear that Montcalm was con- 
veyed to his own residence on the ramparts (on wliich now stands the resi- 
dence of R. H. Wurtele, Esquire). As the city surrendered five days after the 
great battle, it was likely to be bombarded — and, moreover, one-third of the 
houses in it had been burnt and destroyed — we do not see wliy the wounded 
General should have been conveyed from the battle-field to the Chateau St. 
Louis — certainly an exposed situation in the event of a new bombardment ; 

i 



50 

" since I leave the affairs of the King, my dear master, in 
" good hands : I always had a high opinion of the talents 
" of M. de Levis." I will not undertake the panegyric of 
this great man : a true patriot and lover of his king and 
country, possessing many rare and good qualities. Had he 
by chance been born in England, his memory would have 
been celebrated, and transmitted wath honour to posterity. 
Illustrious by his virtue and genius, he deserves to live m 
history ; he was an unfortunate victim to the insatiable 
avarice of some men, and a prey to the immoderate ambi- 
tion of others. His ashes, mingled with those of Indians, 
repose neglected far from his native country, without a 

and, moreover, the city itself, after and during the battle, was considered so 
insecure that the French army, instead of retreating to it for shelter, hurried 
past the General Hospital, over the bridge, to their camp at Beauport, There 
is a passage in Lieutenant-Colonel Beatson's Notes on the Plains of Abraham, 
which we give : — " The valiant Frenchman (Montcalm), regardless of pain, re- 
" laxed not his efforts to rally his broken battalions in their hurried retreat 
" towards the city until he was shot through the loins, when within a few 
" hundred yards of St. Louis Gate.(l) And so invincible was his fortitude 
'• that not even the severity of this mortal stroke could abate his gallant spirit 
" or alter his intrepid bearing. Supported by two grenadiers— one at each 
" side of his horse — he re-entei'ed the city; and in reply to some women who, 
" on seeing blood flow from his wounds as he rode down St. Louis street, on 
" his way to the Chiteau. exclaimed : Oh, mo7i Dieu! mon Dieu! le Marquis 
" est tue ! ! ! he courteously assured them that he was not seriously hurt, and 
' ' begged of them not to distress themselves on his account. — Ce liest rien ! ce 
" n'est rien! Ne vous afflljez pas pour moi, mes bonnen amies." (2) 



(1) M. GarneatJj in his HlHoire du Cannd-^, says :— ''The two Brigadier-Generals. M. 
" de feemezergues and the Baron de St. Ours, fell mortally wounded ; and Mo^^TCAI,^f (who 
■' had already received two wounds), while exerting himself to the utmost to rally hia 
■' troops and preserve order in the retreat, was al.^o mortally wounded in the loins by a 
" muskci-ball. He was at that moment between Les Butten-a-Neveu and St. Louis Gate." 
From the city, on the one side, and from the battle-fielrl, on the other, the ground rises until 
the 1 wn slooes meet and form a ridge ; the summit of which was formerly occupied by a 
windmill belonging to a- man named Neveu or Ncpneu. About midway between this ridge 
and Si:. Loais (^ate, :i'id ro the southward of the St. Louis Road, are some slight eminences, 
still k iow.i by the older French residents as Lev Butten-a-Neiweu or Neoeu's hillocks, and 
about three-quarters of a mile distant from the spot where the British line charged.— R. S. 
Beatson. 

(2) For these particulars 1 am indebted to my friend Mr. G. B. Faribault— a gentleman 
well k :ow '._i 1 Ca ladi for liis researches into the history of the Colony ; whose information 
on tills subject was derived from his much respected fellow-citizen the Hon. John Malcolm 
Frazer— grandson ot one of Wolfe's officers, and now (18.54) one of the oldest inhabitants of 
Quebec ; where, in his childhood and youth, he had the factS) as above narrated, often de- 
scribed to him by an elderly woman who, when about eighteeen years of age, was an eye- 
witness of the scene.— R. S. Beatson. 



51 

magnificent tomb or altars ; General Wolfe has statues in 
England in commemoration of the many faults he commit- 
ted during his expedition in Canada. " How many obscure 
dead," says a modern author, " have received the greatest 
honours by titles yet more vain ? injustice of mankind ! 
The mausolea adorn the temples to repeat continually false 
praise ; and history, which ought to be the sacred asylum 
of truth, shows that statues and panegyrics are almost al- 
ways the monuments of prejudice, and that flattery seeks to 
immortalise unjust reputations." 

When I was informed of M. de Montcalm's misfortune, 1 
sent him immediately his servant Joseph, begging him to 
acquaint me if I could be of any service to him, and in that 
case I would be with him at Quebec immediately. Joseph 
came back in a moment to the horn work, and grieved me 
to the inmost of my soul by M. de Montcalm's answer: 
" that it was needless to come to him, as he had only a few 
hours to live, and he advised me to keep with Poularies 
until the arrival of M de Levis at the army." Thus per- 
ished a great man, generally unknown and unregretted by 
his countrymen — a man who would have become the idol 
and ornament of any other country in Europe. 

The French array in flight, scattered and entirely dis- 
persed, rushed towards the town. Few of them entered 
Quebec ; they went down the heights of Abraham, opposite 
to the Intendant's Palace (past St. John's gate) directing 
their course to the hornwork, and following the borders of 
the River St. Charles. Seeing the impossibility of rallying 
our troops, I determined myself to go down the hill at the 
windmill, near the bakehouse,=^ and from thence across 
over the meadows to the hornwork, resolved not to approach 
Quebec, from my apprehension of being shut up there with 
a part of our army, which might have been the case if the 



* This bakehouse appears to have been some where at the foot of Abra- 
ham's hill. 



52 

victors had drawn all the advantage they could have reap- 
ed from our defeat. It is true the death of the general-in- 
chief — an event which ncA^er fails to create the greatest dis- 
order and confusion in an army — may plead as an excuse 
for the English neglecting so easy an operation as to take 
all our army prisoners. 

But, instead of following immediately my ideas. 1 was 
cairied off by the flow of the fugitives, without being 
able to stop them or myself until I got to a hollow swampy 
ground, where some gunners were endeavouring to save a 
field-piece which stuck there, and I stayed an instant with 
them to encourage them to draw it to the town. Return- 
ing back upon the rising ground, I was astonished to find 
myself in the centre of the English army, who had advanc- 
ed w^hilst I w^as in the hollow with the gunners, and tak- 
ing me for a general, on account of my fine black horse, 
they treated me as such by saluting me with a thousand 
musket shots from half of the front of their army, which 
had formed a crescent. I was, nevertheless, bent on reach- 
ing the windmill, and I escaped their terrible fire without 
any other harm than four balls through my clothes, which 
shattered them ; a ball lodged in the pommel of my saddle, 
and fotir balls in my horse's body, w^ho lived, notwithstand- 
ing his wounds, until he had carried me to the horn work. 

It is impossible to imagine the disorder and confusion 
that I found in the hornwork.f The dread and consterna- 
tion was general. M. de Vaudretiil listened to everybody, 
and was always of the advice of he who spoke last. No 
order was given with reflection and wath coolness, none 
knowing w^hat to order or what to do. When the English 
had repulsed the two hundred Canadians that had gone up 
the height at the same time that I came down from it, pur- 



t The excavations of these French v, orks ai'e very visible to this day be- 
hind Mr. G. H. Parke's residence, Kingtield, Charlesbourg road. The horu- 
work appears to liave covered about tweivt; acres of ground, surrounded by a 
ditch. 



53 

suing them down to the bakehouse, our men lost their 
heads entirely ; they became demoralized, imagining that . 
the English troops, then at the bakehouse, would in an 
instant cross the plain and fly over the St. Charles river 
into the hornwork as with wings. It is certain that when 
fear once seizes hold of men it not only deprives them to- 
tally of their judgment and reflection, but also of the use 
of their eyes and their ears, and they become a thousand 
times worse than the brute creation, guided by instinct 
only, or by that small portion of reason which the author 
of nature has assigned it, since it preserves the use of it on 
all occasions. How much inferior to them do the greater 
portion of mankind appear, with their boasted reason, when 
reduced to madness and automata, on occasions when they 
require the more the use of their reason. 

The hornwork had the River St. Charles before it, about 
seventy paces broad, which served it better than an artifi- 
cial ditch ; its front, facing the river and the heights, was 
composed of strong, thick, and high palisades, planted per- 
pendicularly, with gunholes pierced for several pieces of 
large cannon in it ; the river is deep and only fordable at 
low VA^ater, at a musket shot before the fort. This made it 
more difficult to be forced on that side than on its other 
side of earthworks facing Beauport, which had a more 
formidable apf»earance ; and the hornwork certainly on 
that side was not in the least danger of being taken by the 
English, by an assault from the other side of the river. On 
the appearance of the English troops on the plain of the 
bakehouse, Montguet and l^a Motte, two old captains in 
the Regiment of Boarn, cried out wilh vehemence to M. de 
Yaudreuil, " that the hornwork would be taken in an in- 
stant, by an assault, sword in hand ; that we would be all 
cut to pieces without quarter, and that nothing else would 
save us but an immediate and general capitulation of Can- 
ada, giving it up to the English." 



54 

Montreuil told them that " a fortification such as the 
hornwork was not to be taken so easily." In short, there 
arose a general cry in the hornwork to cut the bridge of 
boats.=^ It is worthy of remark, that not a fourth of our 
army had yet arrived at it, and the remainder, by cutting 
the bridge, would have been left on the other side of the 
river as victims to the victors. The regiment ' Royal lious- 
sillon' was at that moment at the distance of a musket shot 
from the hornwork, approaching to pass the bridge. As I 
had already been in such adventures, I did not lose my 
presence of mind, and having still a shadow remaining of 
that regard, which the army accorded me on account of 
the esteem and confidence which M. de Levis and M. de 
Montcalm had always shown me publicly, I called to M. 
Ilugon, who commanded, for a pass in the hornwork, and 
begged of him to accompany me to the bridge. We ran 
there, and without asking who had given the order to cut 
it, we chased away the soldiers with their uplifted axes 
ready to execute that extravagant and wicked operation. 

M. de Vaudreuil was closeted in a house in the inside of 
the hornwork with the Intendant and with some other per- 
sons. I suspected they were busy drafting the articles for 
a general capitulation, and I entered the house, where I had 
only time to see the Intendant with a pen in his hand 
writing upon a sheet of paper, when M. de Vaudreuil told 
me I had no business there. Having answered him that 
what he said was true, I retired immediately, in wrath, to 
see them intent on giving up so scandalously a dependency 
for the preservation of which so much blood and treasure 
had been expended. On leaving the house, 1 met M. 
Dalquier, an old, brave, downright honest man, com- 
mander of the regiment of Beam, with the true character 
of a good officer — the marks of Mars ail over his body. I 



* It crossed the St. Charles a little higher iip tlian the Marine Hospital, at 
the foot of Crown street. — (J. M, L.) 



55 

told him it was being debated within the house, to give 
up Canada to the English by a capitulation, and I hurried 
him in to stand up for the King's cause, and advocate the 
welfare of his country. I then quitted the hornwork to 
join Poularies at the Ravine^ of Beauport ; but having met 
him about three or four hundred paces from the hornwork, 
on his w^ay to it, I told him what was being discussed 
there. He answered me, that sooner than consent to a ca- 
pitulation, he would shed the last drop of his blood. He 
told me to look on his table and house as my own, advised 
me to go there directly to repose myself, and clapping spurs 
to his horse, he flew like lightning to the hornwork. 

As Poularies was an officer of great ])ravery, full of hon- 
our and of rare merit, I was then certain that he and Dal- 
quier would break up the measures of designing men. 
Many motives induced me to act strenuously for the good of 
the service ; amongst others, my gratitude for the Sove- 
reign who had given me bread ; also, my affection and in- 
violable friendship for M. de Levis in his absence, who 
Was now Commander-in-Chief of the French armies in 
Canada by the death of M. de Montcalm. I continued sor- 
rowfully jogging on to Beaux)ort, with a very heavy heart 
for the loss of my dear friend, M. de Montcalm, sinking 
with weariness and lost in reflection upon the changes 
which Providence had brought about in the space oi three 
or four hours. 

Poularies came back to his lodgings at Beauport about two 
in the afternoon, and he brought me the ageeeable news of 
having converted the project of a capitulation into a retreat 
to Jacques-Cartier, there to wait the arrival of M. de Levis ; 
and they despatched a courier immediately to Montreal to 
inform him of our misfortune at Quebec, which, to all appear- 
ance, would not have happened to us if M. de Yaudreuil 



* A small bridge supported on masonry has since been built at this spot, 
exactly across the main road at Brown's mills. — (J. M. L.) 



56 

had not sent him away, through some political reason, to 
command there, without troops except those who were 
with M. de Bourlamarque at L'Isle aux Noix— an officer of 
great knowledge. The departure of the army was agreed 
upon to be at night, and all the regiments were ordered to 
their respective encampments until further orders. The 
decision for a retreat was to be kept a great secret, and not 
even communicated to the officers. I passed the afternoon 
with Poularies, hoping each moment to receive from Mon- 
treuil — Major-General of the army — the order of the retreat 
for the regiment Royal Roussilloii ; but having no word of 
it at eight o'clock in the evening, and it being a dark night, 
Poularies sent his Adjutant to M. de Vaudreuil to receive his 
orders for the left. Poularies instantly returned to inform 
him that the right of our army was gone away with M. de 
Vaudreuil without his having given any orders concerning 
the retreat, and that they followed the highway to the horn- 
work. Castaigne, his Adjutant, could give no further ac- 
count of this famous retreat, only that all the troops on our 
right were marched olT. It can be easily imagined how^ 
much we were confounded by this ignorant and stupid con- 
duct, which can scarce appear credible to the most ignorant 
military man. 

Poularies sent immediately to inform the post next to his 
regiment of the retreat, with orders to acquaint all the left 
of it, from post to post, between Beauport and the Sault de 
Montmorency. 

I then set out with him and his regiment, following those 
before us as the other posts to our left folio-wed us, without 
any other guides, orders or instructions with regard to the 
roads we should take, or where we should go to ; this was 
left to chance, or at least w^as a secret which M. de Vaud- 
reuil kept to himself in petto. It was a march entirely in 
the Indian manner ; not a retreat, but a horrid, abominable 
flight, a thousand times worse than that in the morning up- 



57 

m the heights of Abraham, with such disorder and con- 
tusion that, had the English known it, three hundred men 
sent after us would have been sufficient to destroy and cut 
all our army to pieces. Except the regiment Royal Rous- 
sillon, which Poularies, always a rigid and severe disciplin- 
arian, kept together in order, there were not to be seen thirty 
soldiers together of any other regiment. They w^ereallmix 
ed, scattered, dispersed, and running as hard as they could, 
as if the English army was at their heels. There never was 
a more favourable position to make a beautiful, well-com- 
bined retreat, in bright day, and in sight of the English 
Army looking at us, without having the smallest reason to 
fear anything within their powder to oppose it, as I had ob- 
tained a perfect knowledg-e of the locale from Beauport to 
the Sault de Montmorency during some months that I was 
there constantly wath M. de Levis and M. de Montcalm. I 
thought myself in a position to foretell to Poularies the 
probable order of retreat, and the route w^hich would be as- 
signed to each regiment for their march to the Lorette vil- 
lage. I was greatly deceived, and indeed could never have 
foreseen the route which our entire army followed to reach 
Lorette, and which prolonged our march prodigiously for 
the centre of our army, and still more for our left at the 
Sault de Montmorency. There is a highway in a straight 
line from the Sault de Montmorency to Lorette, w^hich 
makes a side of a triangle formed by another highway from 
the Sault to Quebec, and by another road from Lorette to 
the horn work, which formed the base. In the highway 
from the Sault to the horn work there are eight or nine cross 
roads of communication from it to the road from the Sault 
to Lorette, which are shorter as they approach to the point 
of the angle at the Sault. Thus it was natural to believe 
that our army, being encamx:)ed all along the road from the 
Sault to the hornwork, each regiment would have taken 
one of these cross roads, the nearest to his encampment, in 
order to take the straight road from the Sault to Lorette, 



58 

instead of coming to the hornwork to take there the road 
from Quebec to Lorette, by which the left had double the 
distance to march, besides being more liable by approach- 
ing the hornwork so near to the English, to make them dis- 
cover the retreat. 

The army, by this operation, would have arrived all at 
the same time in the road from the Sault to Lorette by the 
difference in the length of these cross ro:ids, and would have 
naturally formed a column all along that road ; and as it 
was not a forced retreat, they had the time from twelve at 
noon until eight at night to send off all the baggage by 
cross roads to Lorette, without the English perceiving it ; 
but supposing them even fully aware of our design, which 
might have been executed in open day, they no way could 
disturb our operations without attacking- the hornwork, 
and attempting the passage of the river St. Charles — a very 
difficult and dangerous affair — where they might be easily 
repulsed, exposing themselves in a moment to lose the 
fruits of their victory, without enjoying it ; and consequent- 
ly they would have been insane had they ventured on such 
a rash enterprise. Instead of these wise measures, which 
common sense alone might have dictated, tents, artillery, the 
military stores, baggage, and all other effects, were left as a 
present to the English ; the officers saved only a few shirts, 
or what they could carry in their pockets : the rest was lost. 
In fact, it would appear, by this strange conduct, that a 
class of men there, from interested views, were furiously 
bent on giving up the colony to the English, so soon as they 
could have a plausible pretext to colour their designs, — by 
lopping off gradually all the means possible to defend it any 
longer. M. de Yaudreuil had still other kind offices in 
reserve for the English. He wrote to de Ramsay, King's 
Lieutenant and Commander in Quebec,^ as soon as the re- 



* The deliberations of the council of war, called at M. Daine's, Mayor of 
Quebec, on the 15th September, 1759, published in de Ramsay's Memoires, iu 
I'SGl, by the Literary and Historical Society, have done an efl'ective, though a 
tardy, justice to de Ramsay's memory. — (J. M. L. ) 



59 

treat was decided : — " That he might propose a capitula- 
" tion for the town eight-aud-forty hours after the departure 
" of our army from our camp at Beauport, upon the best 
" conditions he could obtain from the English." We ran 
along in flight all night ; and at daybreak M. de Bougain- 
ville, w^ith his detachment, joined us near Cap Rouge. In 
the evening, our army arrived at Pointe-aux-Trembles — five 
leagues from Quebec— where it passed the night, and next 
day came to Jacques-Cartier. The English had so little 
suspicion of our retreat, seeing our tents standing without 
any change at our camp, that Belcour — an officer of La 
Rochebaucourt's cavalry — having returned to it with a de- 
tachment, two days after our flight, he found evry thing 
the same as when we left it. He went into, the horn work 
with his detachment, and fired the guns (pointed) at the 
heights of Abraham towards the English camp, which 
greatly alarmed them. 

FINIS. 

[The remainder of the manuscript alludes more parti- 
cularly to the campaign conducted by Chevalier de Levis, 
which ended, in 1760, by the capitulation of Montreal.] 



^^ID ID :B 3Sr JD^A.. 



Extmct of the Register of Marriages, Baptisms and Deaths of the French Cathe- 
dral at Quebec, for 1759 : — 

' ' L'an mil sept cens cinquaiite-iieuf , le quatorzitjme du niois de vSeptembre, 
a €t6 inhiim6 dans I'Eglise des Religieuses Ursixlines de Quebec, haut et puis- 
sant Seigneur Louis Joseph Marquis de Montcahn, Lieutenant General des 
armies du Roy, Conimandeur de I'ordre Royal et niilitaire de 8t. Louis, Com- 
mandant en chef des troupes de terre en rAm6rique Septentrionale, decede le 
meme jour de ses blessures au combat de la veille, muni des sacrements qu'il a 
recus avec beaucoup de pi^t6 et de Religion, Etoient prti.sents i^i son inhuma- 
tion MM. Resche, Cugnet et Collet, chanoines de la Cathedrale, M. de Ramezay, 
Commandant de la Place, et tout le corps des ofHciers. 

(Sign6,) 

" RESCHE, Ptre. Chan. 

" COLLET, Chne. 



